Twilight Pretty Cure (Old Version)
by SaoirseParisa
Summary: Abandoned. Don't read it.
1. I'm a Real Super Hero?

Author's Note: Hi everyone. My name is Juliko, aka Firechick, and this is my debut Pretty Cure fan fic series.

Special thanks go to my beta readers Ameliette and Dreams In Pink! You're both awesome! :)

Now, a warning: this fan fic will deal with some serious issues such as disabilities (I myself am autistic, just so you know), bullying, child abuse, homelessness, hardship, etc, because I feel these are issues that need to be discussed and brought to light. I will do my absolute best to portray these issues as sensitively as possible. I got some backlash on my first try, as you can see from some reviews, and looking back, I'm not proud of how I wrote certain things, so the second half will be rewritten from scratch to be a little less...well, grim and offensive. I actually came up with some new ideas that'll hopefully make it better and more tolerable, and many online friends are helping me with revamping it. Now if you're easily triggered by scenes or even words like this, you are absolutely more than welcome to stop reading the fan fic and go somewhere else. I understand _completely_ if you're susceptible to triggers, and I'll try to post warning on any and all chapters that may have such scenes. I won't have as much time to rewrite the story as I like to, though, because of school, but I'm gonna try and get it done anyway!

But I do hope you'll enjoy the fan fic regardless of its possibly glaring and irredeemable flaws, and I encourage all feedback and criticism. Ifd you have problems with my story, that's fine. You don't have to read it. But I won't stand for bullying, whining, name calling, flaming, or bashing.

_ATTENTION: TRIGGER WARNING FOR BULLYING AND SLIGHT VIOLENCE_

* * *

Twilight Pretty Cure

Chapter 1: I'm a Real Super Hero?! Cure Twilight Shines Through!

_In another world…_

Discord swept across the land like a natural disaster, only this was much worse. It came so suddenly and out of the blue that nobody had time to react, or even understand what just happened. The ground looked as though it had been stripped of all the grass it ever had, leaving mostly a charred, lifeless ground. All the now leafless trees were twisted in unnatural ways. Clouds of smoke curled into the grey sky, polluting the once clean air. Most houses were more or less demolished, some even collapsing into nothing but piles of rubble. Other areas were simply swallowed up by thunderous blue flames that danced wildly, eating whatever was nearby.

It was a total disaster zone.

It was like every single natural disaster attacked it at the same time, but none of this was natural. Not even a little bit.

In the midst of the wreckage, a young, skinny teenager of about fifteen stood looking up at the dismal sky with bloody red eyes shining like a new sports car. His medium length hair, a shining shade of silver, glistened amidst the frightening flames, heavily contrasting with his thin, golden, olive leaf diadem. His pale skin looked almost transparent against his dark attire, a dark brown vest, a lavender ruffle, a short sleeved black shirt, black pants, tall red boots, a red cape, and fingerless red gloves. The smile on his face was a wicked one, not appropriate for the desolate setting. In his hands wass a large, black stone, diamond shaped, about the size of a brick that glowed eerily like the lights of a haunted house, if haunted houses even had working lights at all.

"So this is it...This is the true extent of my new power...Wow! This jewel really is as powerful as everybody says! I've never felt so alive before! Finally, I feel like I can actually do whatever I want!" the young boy whispered softly at first, making him sound like he didn't quite comprehend the situation and everything around him. Once he got a good grip of his surroundings, he yelled and let out a hearty laugh as though he had never felt so free, so alive, in his entire life.

"How could you…?" a hoarse voice asked from just fifteen feet away. It came from a woman whose refined, Navajo Indian-styled clothes were now ripped into tatters, whose steel silver hair was scraggly and dirty, covered in patches of dirt. Her body was covered with fresh scars and scratches. One scar on her face was bleeding slightly. Despite her injuries, she shot daggers at the boy with her green eyes. "How could you do this to us, Zenjin?! This is your home! Do you have any idea what you've done?!" The woman yelled, her voice going up an octave.

What this boy had done was absolutely reprehensible in her eyes.

He barely noticed her at first, but he did turn around to look at her once he stopped laughing. The look in his red eyes was full of bloodlust and hate, and he had wicked smile to go with it. The woman's face went pale as soon as they made eye contact; she really didn't like the look on his face. There was no empathy, no mercy, nothing. Only hate and malice, with a touch of what appeared to be childlike curiosity. "Oh, I _know_ what I've done. Now I truly understand what this jewel is capable of...and I LOVE IT!"

"What?!" The woman exclaimed. Her eyes went wide with shock and her shoulders stiffered as she saw the black jewel weighing in his palms. "No! You...you've corrupted the Energia with your hatred!"

"So that's its name...Energia. That's so stupid! You could have come up with something better, Queen," Zenjin jeered, without any hint of remorse in his high pitched voice.

"Zenjin! Look what you've done! So many of our citizens have died because you corrupted the Energia! Have you no remorse at all?! Please, stop! Give the Energia back to us! You don't know what it's capable of, especially in the wrong hands! It's easily influenced by evil feelings like hatred and lust! Give it back so we can restore Rozaniela back to normal! Please!" The Queen shouted with desperation and pleading in her shrill voice.

Hiding behind a nearby gnarled tree were four small, stuffed animal-like creatures, floating in the air, fearful of the silver haired boy. their large, round eyes wide with fright, afraid of what he could do next.

"Do I look like I care?" Zenjin asked right before stretching out one of his hands and firing an ominous purple and black beam at the weak woman, knocking her off her feet and causing her to scream in agony.

"Queen Malgorzata!" The four floating animals cried as they flew over to the woman. The light blue one's hands began to glow as it placed them over her wound.

"He's out of control!" The pale purple one exclaimed frightfully.

"What are we going to do?! He's destroyed 80% of Rozaniela! We've never seen destruction of this caliber before!" The light blue wailed. Malgorzata's wound was close to healing.

"Actually...there is a way we can fix this…" Queen Malgorzata croaked.

"What? There is?" The orange one asked, confused.

"Yes...take a guess," Queen Malgorzata said. Some of her injuries healed while the fairies ruminated. The answer dawned on them when the blue fairy finished healing Malgorzata's shoulder.

"No! No! You can't be suggesting _that_!" The light pink one shouted, with denial peppering her voice.

"We don't know if they truly exist or not!" The pale purple one agreed, skeptical of the Queen's words.

Queen Malgorzata rummaged through part of her dress and pulled out four small, star shaped bottles topped with heart caps in four different colors: lavender purple, ocean blue, sunny yellow, and mandarin orange. They looked like perfume bottles, but they were completely empty.

"These Heart Lighters are proof enough that they exist. My dearest fairies...you must go to Earth to find humans whose hearts resonate with these Heart Lighters...the Pretty Cures. They are the only ones who can stop Zenjin's malice and return the Energia back to its original state...and save what's left of Rozaniela," Queen Malgozata ordered. Although she was weak, her voice still had enough gravity that in a way told the fairies that she was serious.

"But we don't even know how we're supposed to tell if they're the Pretty Cures or not! We've never been able to find out the actual requirements for being a Pretty Cure!" The orange one argued.

"It doesn't matter! Just go to Earth and find them! I don't care who it is, how old they are, how incapable they are, whatever! As long as their hearts resonate with these Heart Lighters...then they can help us. Go to Earth! Now!" Queen Malgorzata ordered, her voice going up an octave.

The Heart Lighters glowed in their respective colors and each one disappeared inside the clips on their ribbons.

"But we can't just leave you here!" The pale purple fairy cried, her voice consumed by worry.

The pink fairy let out a high pitched scream. "Oh no! Look!"

It was a sight that all five of them dreaded. The jewel was glowing in an ominous black light. It floated toward an ecstatic Zenjin and went inside his chest. As soon as it disappeared, he cried out in pain. He felt as though his entire body was on fire, mirroring the house and trees he had destroyed just minutes earlier. However, he soon grew accustomed to the burning sensation, cackling with delight.

"Yes...the power is inside me...my body's on fire...wow! This is great! I can do whatever I want from now on! YES!" Zenjin howled happily; he was experiencing the ultimate high.

The orange fairy balled her little fists and grinded her teeth. "How dare you...WE ALL RAISED YOU!" With a valiant battle cry, she flitted after the boy, her sky blue eyes blazing with anger.

"Sunbeam! NO!" The pale purple fairy tried to grab her, but Sunbeam was too fast.

Much to Sunbeam's dismay, she couldn't get close enough, as Zenjin fired a black beam of light at her, which she barely evaded. He didn't even look! He just continued smiling and laughing maniacally. Sunbeam, realizing that the power he successfully acquired from absorbing the Energia was too great for her to handle, went back to the injured Queen.

"His rampage on Rozaniela...it's just a test run," Malgorzata began with a grim tone of voice. "His real intention is to go to Earth. For what reason, I don't know. We don't know what's going on in his head, but that's what I fear the most. Please, my dear fairies. Sunbeam, Moonbeam, Starbeam, Lovebeam. Get to Earth before he does. Find the people whose hearts resonate with the Heart Lighters. They can stop him. I'm begging you…"

Silently but reluctantly, the fairies nodded and flew away to the sky, with the Heart Lighters tucked away in the bows around their necks. They were all unsure of what would happen. But the Queen trusted them. Why she trusted them of all creatures, they had no idea. Regardless, they couldn't let their Queen down.

It was complete their mission or die trying. They flew out of the stratosphere, but not before Zenjin glanced up, spotting them in the distance.

"Pheh! Those blasted fairies! They better not interfere with my quest!" Zenjin roared as he himself flew up to sky, bloodlust consuming every fiber of his soul, flowing through all of his veins.

* * *

At 6:00 AM, most people would be asleep. However, in the Tasogare house, two kids in particular weren't, one of them a girl of twelve, with very short raven black hair and eyes as green and dark as a forest. If one didn't know better, they would assume she was a boy. Alert and wide awake, the morning sky welcoming the first morning blue, the girl turned on her bedroom light, sat on her floor, using a purple colored pencil to finish coloring in the cat ears of a cat girl superhero she created.

Her door was wide open, so she could hear a boy of fifteen yawning right out loud, but she was too busy drawing to really care. "Uuuugh...I can't believe they're making us wake up this early..." The blue eyed boy mused, his chocolate brown hair frizzy and unbrushed. But when he saw the girl sitting in her room in her light blue snowflake pajamas drawing away contentedly, he found himself smiling warmly.

He walked over and sat on the floor with her. "You're up early. What's that, Riko?"

"Twilight Cat," Riko replied, still coloring Twilight Cat's ears.

"You're really good. I wish I was as good as you."

Suddenly, Riko looked up at him with a concerned look in her eyes. "Hikage. Do you really have to go to school this early every day?"

Hikage ruffled his sister's hair. "Yeah. It's stupid but it's gotta be done. I know for a fact that you're not looking forward to school, now are you?"

Riko looked down at her drawing. "You read me like a map."

"Of course! I'm your brother and that's my job!"

Riko clutched her purple colored pencil. "I don't wanna go to school. They'll hate me for sure," Riko murmured nervously.

"This is a brand new place, Riko. I'm sure you'll find some friends here," Hikage told her reassuringly. "If I can do it, I know you can. And if anyone picks on you, let me know and I'll give them a good spanking!"

Riko smiled dubiously. "Thanks."

Hikage got himself ready, fixed himself breakfast, and waited at the corner of the street for the school bus. A large yellow mass pulled up, and when it left, Hikage was no longer there. Riko found this to be a great opportunity to read one of her mangas and lose herself in the adventures of Princess Hinata.

As Riko was reading, a little girl of about seven came into her room with a pouty look on her face. She had straight black hair that went to her shoulders and green eyes She was wearing a long sleeved pink shirt, a white skirt, black shoes, and pink and red socks dotted with hearts. The girl had a Barbie doll in her hand and stomped over to Riko. "Hey!" The girl shouted.

No answer.

"Hey! Riko!" Again, no response.

The girl puffed her face out petulantly. "Are you being weird again?!"

Once again, nothing

_'Ignore her, ignore her...'_ Riko told herself as she kept her eyes glued to her book. _'Just ignore her, like Hikage says. It'll make her get bored and leave me alone.'_

Unfortunately, that outcome didn't happen. Instead, Rina took her Barbie doll and threw it right at Riko's head. "Owww!" Riko flinched when the Barbie's leg made contact with her cheek. She turned to the little girl with an angry glare. "Rina! What did you do that for?! Don't you know it's rude to throw stuff at people?!"

"It's your own fault for being weird and daydreaming again!" Rina whined like a spoiled brat.

"What's going on in here?" Soon, their surprised parents entered the room, having heard the commotion.

Riko was quick to point her finger at the culprit. "Rina threw one of her Barbies at me!"

The man crossed his arms and gave Rina a stern glare. "Is this true, Rina? How many times do we have to tell you? We don't hit people in this house!"

Rina indiscreetly pointed at Riko and blurted out, "She's being weird and stupid again! She's supposed to be the older sister!"

"It's okay if she only does it in the house. But that doesn't make it right for you to throw things at your big sister or call her names, young lady. Now I want you to apologize," The woman added.

"But Mom-"

"Apologize. Now."

She couldn't argue with her mother. Rina muttered, "Sorry…"

Riko said nothing. _'You're not sorry at all, you brat! You're just doing it because Mom told you to!'_ She fumed.

"That's better. Now go and get ready. Your first day of school starts in an hour," The father told them. Rina promptly left her room, and so did their parents, leaving Riko alone.

Riko quickly ran into her cheery little bedroom and changed into some clean clothes, today's choices being a short sleeved light purple shirt, a sleeveless white hoodie with a chibi cartoon cat on it, comfy brown shorts, white socks dotted with pink stars, and black and white sneakers. With a bit of a dazed look on her face, she picked up her pink school bag, sat on her bed, and stuffed it with notebooks, textbooks, and a manga she planned to read inside.

"Arinao, would you mind taking the girls to school before work? I have some bills I have to pay," The mother asked her husband. Riko peeled a banana open and ate it.

"Sure, Saki. I don't mind at all," Arinao replied with a smile.

"Oh, thank you! I really appreciate this, Ari," Saki exclaimed happily as she wrapped her loving arms around her faithful husband's neck. Riko finished her banana, went into the fridge, and began eating some of her favorite vanilla cream yogurt. Upon readying her lunch, Riko returned to her drawing, adding some texture to Twilight Cat's shirt.

Riko loved drawing. It was practically her salvation. "I wonder if I should make her wear a scarf? Nah, it'd lower her speed," Riko mused to herself, wondering if something was missing.

All of a sudden, she felt something soft and furry brush against her arm. She looked to her left and found that it was one of her cats, a pretty tortoise shell cat with brown and yellow fur, with hazel green eyes.

"Meow," The pretty little tortoise shell cat meowed.

"Hi Reese! You're always making me happy. Look! I'm drawing more Twilight Cat pictures! Do you think I should give her a sidekick?" Riko chirped upon seeing the cute kitten.

"Meow."

"Yeah, you're right. Twilight Cat needs to do more stuff herself. Thanks for the advice. Meow!" Riko replied playfully before stroking her head. "I do hope you're not getting into fights with Caroline again."

"Meow."

Once she finished doodling and playing with Reese, she put her sketchbook and a few colored pencils in her book bag and zipped it up tight. Her eyes fell to the fluffy orange cat ears and a fake cat tail with black stripes on them. She itched to put them on, turning herself into a cat, chasing mice, catching fish, and playing with yarn.

It was like they were calling out to her, saying, _"Put us on! You know you want to! Don't you want to pretend to be Twilight Cat or a real cat or some other anime hero?"_ In the end she decided against it. She resisted the temptation and went back downstairs, where she found Arinao in the den watching the news.

"_Currently, there are no new leads regarding orphanages closing unexpectedly in Russia, Romania, China, North Korea, Afghanistan, and other countries, or why children and babies from those orphanages are disappearing by the thousands, leaving them empty. We have also received eyewitness reports claiming the local homeless people are disappearing from the streets, as though they never existed. Investigators are still having a hard time finding credence to these claims, but we can't deny that these disappearances and foreclosures are very real, and running rampant all over. We only pray that those children and babies are found safe and sound,"_ A female newscaster reported.

Arinao glanced up at Riko. "We're leaving, Riko. Are you ready?"

"Yes, Dad!" Riko grabbed her tan coat, purple lunch box, and her pink school bag and followed Arinao and Rina to their silver BMW.

As they made the short jaunt to school, Riko stared at the scenery passing by. She liked the amount of greenery surrounding them, and how lush the trees looked, like they were never tainted or contaminated. But she really didn't want to go where their car was heading.

"This'll be a big adjustment for you, Riko. But if you do your best and keep your chin up, everything will be just fine. It's a new school. You'll get what you really need here," Arinao explained kindly.

"I don't want to go to school," Riko muttered sadly, clinging to her school bag, her previous happiness dissipating into thin air.

"How come?"

"They'll hate me. They always do, no matter where I go."

"You're exaggerating. Not everyone is the same as the kids at your old schools. This is a brand new place. I know it'll be hard, but you'll make it through. You always have considering everything you went through. But try to keep your play acting and daydreaming to a minimum this year, okay?" Arinao replied, hoping to reassure her, but he wondered if he sounded condescending instead.

"They're gonna hate her anyway, Dad. Nobody wants to be friends with Riko. She's not normal, unlike me!" Rina proclaimed with a smug smile and arms crossed like she was the boss of a big-shot company.

"Hey!" Riko yelled, surprised that her younger sister would make such a ridiculous claim. But Rina's venomous words hit her right in the heart, worsening her anxiety.

"Rina! Watch your mouth! Would you like it if someone told you nobody wanted to be friends with you? Not another word out of you," Arinao scolded.

"Fine…but you know its true…" Rina muttered under her breath.

"Do you have your schedule?"

"Yeah. It's in here," Riko pointed to her backpack.

"Oh! Here it is! Hikaribashi Middle School!" The car pulled in front of a large, pale grey brick building.

Riko had to admit, it looked a lot nicer than her previous school, which was rather unkempt and nitty gritty. This one looked very clean. The grass around it looked nice despite being overrun with kids her own age. There was a blacktop next to it, where most of the children played. That was also something her old school had. However, it was cloudy and dreary out, which made the school itself look a little stiff and uninteresting.

"You have a good day, Riko. Remember to keep your chin up and do the best you can."

"Thanks," Riko flashed a forced smile.

"Don't act weird!" Rina piped in.

"Ri-NA…" Arinao warned before Riko closed the door to the back seat and hopped onto the grass. With that, Arinao drove away so he could drop Rina off at her own school.

At first, Riko didn't want to go any further. Too many kids were playing, talking, laughing, and already in their own groups of friends. She wasn't sure what to do. Should she talk to someone? But who could she talk to? She didn't know anybody, and if she did talk to anyone, would they like her or hate her? Riko assumed they'd hate her right off because that's what she'd been used to all her life. She really didn't expect to make any friends, only enemies, just for existing. She already wished she was back at home, drawing more pictures of Twilight Cat and cuddling with her pets.

_Riiiiiiiiiing_

The bell rang, its sound echoing in the air, signaling for everyone to go in. Riko yanked out her schedule, and tried to find her assigned homeroom, F9. Luckily for her, it wasn't hard to find. Shyly, she opened the door, finding a classroom full of children and one female teacher, all of whom immediately turned their heads to stare at her with confusion and curiosity. She was frozen in place by their stares. Her face became contorted with blatant anguish and trepidation.

'_Oh no. They're all staring at me like I'm some kind of zombie who's out to eat them. I wanna go home and work on more Twilight Cat drawings...'_ Riko thought anxiously. She knew she couldn't leave even if she wanted to.

"Everyone? May I have your attention please? As you all know, we have a new friend joining us today. Want to come up to the front and say hello?" The female teacher explained kindly, then asked for Riko to come to the front.

'_No! That's the last thing I want! Just my being here is embarrassing enough as it is! But the front of the class?! Absolutely not!'_ Riko screamed in her head. She wanted to run away as far as she could. But she knew she'd get in trouble if she ran out of the school.

She turned around and faced the class. All eyes were on her. Her throat closed up. She couldn't spit anything out, not even a hello. The teacher seemed to get the message and decided to take the initiative by writing her name on the board with a piece of chalk. Tasogare Riko, it read.

"Everyone, I'd like you all to meet Tasogare Riko-chan. She and her family moved here from Yokosuka a month ago. She's new here, so help her out when you can, okay?" The teacher elaborated, but the kids didn't seem to care all that much. "Care to say a few words, Tasogare-san?"

She couldn't say anything. All she could do was allow her brain to be consumed by a torrent of worries, anxieties, questions. Would these kids be different from the ones from her last school, or would they be exactly the same? She assumed the latter was more likely. Would they assume she's stupid just by looking at her? She heard someone say she doesn't look too smart. Would they pick on her? Would they like her? Riko really wanted to go home. Now. Nothing was coming out of her mouth. The silence was too tense.

"Hey weirdo! What's wrong? Cat got your tongue? Or are you too stupid to talk?" One girl with short, wavy orange hair, gold eyes, and a rather large, unsightly, and disgusting scar on her left cheek proclaimed in a venomous tone.

"Can it, Asagi!" A red haired, bespectacled boy in a wheelchair yelled.

"You shut up, Four Eyes!" The girl, Asagi, snapped back.

"Asagi Marina! One more word out of you and you're getting a special one-way ticket to the principal's office, so either behave or be on your way!" The teacher scolded. Just what she needed, the class problem child making a scene right on the first day of school. She then turned to Riko and said in a soft voice, "Feel free to take your seat now. There's one right next to Mitomo-kun."

Quickly, Riko ran to the empty seat and sat down. Strangely enough, she looked over and realized she was sitting right next to the red haired boy in the wheelchair who yelled at Marina. He was probably the one the teacher said is Mitomo. She secretly thought that he looked nice in his dark grey unzipped hoodie, blue jeans, and green shirt. She was quite surprised by this turn of events. As soon as he saw her looking at her, he looked back and smiled, which made Riko turn her head away and stare down at her schedule.

"Don't worry about Asagi. She picks on everybody, me included. Don't feel like you have to suck up to her," The boy whispered in a low voice.

Riko nodded in response, which seemed to be fine with him. She looked at her schedule to make sure everything on it was right.

_Name: Tasogare Riko_

_Schedule:_

_1st Period: Homeroom. Teacher: Omori Seiko (F9)_

_2nd Period: Art. Teacher: Sasamoto Amika (F2)_

_3rd Period: Gym. Teacher: Hanazawa Tsutomu (Auditorium)_

_4th Period: Math. Teacher: Ikari Isao (F9)_

_5th Period: Lunch. (Auditorium)_

_6th Period: Recess_

_7th Period: Science. Teacher: Amane Gendo (F5)_

_8th Period: Health. Teacher: Tsutsumi Shinju (F9)_

_9th Period: English. Oginome Chisaki (F6)_

As she made an attempt to memorize her day to come, she couldn't help but overhear some classmates talking. "Tch. Is Asagi ever gonna stop being a jerk?"

"No. She's a criminal's kid. They'll never stop being jerks."

"I wish she'd go to jail already. It's where she belongs."

"What's her deal?"

"Don't you know? Her dad was some big shot politician and he just got thrown in jail. Something about stealing money and making people poor as dirt."

Riko looked toward Marina to find her face shining. It looked a little wet, like she's crying. Riko put a hand to her mouth. _'Is she crying?'_ Then it hit her. She had just heard some gossip about her. Maybe she's sick and tired of people talking bad about her? Riko figured that was the best answer. Marina wiped her swollen eyes with her arm, keeping her sullen expression.

'_I wish they'd just stop and get over it,'_ Marina thought as she buried her face in her arms, wishing she was somewhere else.

Once homeroom was over, Riko was able to get to all of her classes on time. It helped that there was more time in between classes and the fact that they were all on the same floor. This eased her anxiety somewhat. She breezed through her first classes just fine, though math was going to take some getting used to. Riko was never one to excel at math. But the teacher seemed nice, much nicer than her other teachers back at her old school. He'd probably help her out if she asked nicely. She didn't make any friends during this period of time. She didn't approach anyone, as she was too shy and frightened to do so, but nobody approached her either, not that she cared.

Then lunch came around. Unlike her old school, where everyone sat at long, large, rectangular tables that folded up, all the tables in the lunch room were round, and scattered all over the auditorium, which was the lunch room in this school. But all of them were full save for one, and even that one was hard to get to because it was so crowded. But she got there and ate her lunch quietly and without trouble.

'_I don't mind sitting alone. Here, nobody will bother me or throw food at me or yell and scream and try to touch me or knock me over or rub against me or get food all over my books. At least this is great! Still a little loud, though,'_ Riko thought happily, smiling to herself as she munched on her peanut butter sandwich. It helped that she was away from the other kids, who weren't even paying attention to her, so she can enjoy her alone time. Admittedly, she did have to cover her ears a little because of kids being rowdy, tables and chairs making screechy noises against the floor while being moved, the scratchy PA system, and kids banging on the tables with their arms. But other than that, everything else was fine.

For the most part, school went by without incident until recess came around.

The blacktop was a lot bigger than her previous school, and unlike that one, there were little tables and benches she could sit on. As usual, children were running around, talking to each other, playing four square, and other things. She was about to sit down and read until she saw the red haired boy in the wheelchair sitting a little further away.

But as soon as she saw him, she saw Marina angrily stomping toward him. Riko could tell she had a bone to pick with him. What was she going to do? Should she interfere? Or should she not, out of fear that Marina might beat her up? She certainly looked strong, like she could take down a gang of middle school boys singlehanded. Riko froze in place and watched as Marina approached the boy, yanked him off of his wheelchair, causing him to fall to the ground, and before he could get up, she smacked the glasses off of his face, sending them bouncing on the concrete. Riko's hands flew to her mouth in horror. The boy, however, wasn't deterred.

Despite losing his eyesight and means of getting around, the boy was not deterred. "What'd you do that for?!" Marina showed no sympathy.

"This is what you get for not knowing your place and getting in my business, Four Eyes!" Marina jeered, looking like she was about to step on him. "You need to know better than to stick your nose and broken legs in places where you're not wanted, idiot!"

"You're an even bigger idiot!" The boy snapped back with gusto.

'_What?!'_ Riko was appalled. Her fear suddenly morphed straight into anger. How could this girl be so cruel? Worst of all, nobody was helping him! She was not going to let this girl get away with her cruel deed.

No she wouldn't.

Without any trepidation at all, Riko stomped over to Marina and gave her a good shove. It wasn't strong enough to knock her down, but it was just enough to get her attention. "Leave him alone! You shouldn't be picking on people like that! You could have hurt him!"

Marina was surprised, but not deterred. "What's it to you, newbie?!"

Riko didn't know what that meant, but she still kept going. "I saw you push him and say those mean things! Don't you know it's rude and mean to pick on people?!"

Soon, she herself was knocked over. She fell on her rear end, which really did hurt, but Marina didn't care one bit, not that Riko expected her to. "Mind your own business, you freak!"

"Asagi!" The voice of a male teacher caught their attention, causing all of the kids to turn around. The man grabbed Marina's arm tightly and kept a firm grip on her. She was anything but happy.

"Let me go!"

"I've had enough of you! It's the first day of school and you're already causing trouble! You are coming with me to the principal's office, young lady!" The man dragged Marina from the blacktop, back into the school building.

After that, Riko saw the boy's glasses, picked them up, and held them up to his face. "Here you go."

"Thanks," The boy said as he gently took them and put them on. Riko rolled his heavy electric wheelchair close to him so he could get back in.

"Do you need help getting in?" Riko asked, concerned.

"Nah, I'm good. See?" The boy said as he pulled himself back into his wheelchair. "Thanks for standing up to her. I didn't think you had it in you."

She couldn't help but agree with him. "You're welcome. I didn't like how she was treating you, so...I figured I might as well actually do something right for once," Riko muttered shyly. "You're not hurt, are you?"

"Nah, I'm good. Not a scratch on me," The boy replied. Riko had a hard time believing that, but she didn't say it out of fear that she might hurt his feelings.

"Glad you're okay. I'm gonna go-" Riko wanted to walk away until the boy suddenly let out a surprised sounding yelp, which made her turn around in both fright and confusion. "What's...wrong? Did I do something bad?"

"No. It's...that book...is that Hinata Sun Child?!" The boy's green eyes were wide and bright, though big with shock.

Now it was Riko's turn to be surprised. Someone actually knew about the book she had tucked underneath her arm? She looked at the book, then at the boy a few times before it finally dawned on her. "You...you actually know about this?"

"Of course! I freaking love that manga!" The boy cheered with a big, bright smile making his light skinned face quite radiant.

Riko could feel a big smile being painted on her own face, something that was pretty rare when it came to the subject of making friends. Someone actually knew about the manga she's reading! Someone who acted and sounded like he actually knows his stuff! Riko could feel joy bursting from within her heart. This could be it.

"...have you read up to the part where she realizes that all the hardship she went through was because of her annoying sister and where she goes to the tower to confront her?"

"Yeah! And that scene where she calls her out on everything and tells her to finally acknowledge her for who she is and not treat her like someone she has to feel sorry for?! God, I love that scene!"

"What about the part where her friend saves her from the corrupted hippocampi?!"

"I'm so sad with how that turned out! I can't believe they killed off Rochelle! She was my favorite! But I love that hippocampi friend she made in that part! Liberty I think was her name?"

They happily chatted about it for just a few minutes before they realized they were rambling. But it was the good kind of rambling, and once they stopped, they burst into laughter. It felt so good to Riko; she finally found someone she could really call a friend. She had never laughed so much before, and it felt like she could get rid of the sadness she had before. She felt as if a weight had been lifted off of her heart.

Riko stopped laughing. "I...I've never met anyone who even knew Hinata Sun Child even existed…"

"Me neither. You're pretty cool, y'know that? Oh! I completely forgot! Hi! My name's Mitomo Kyoya," Kyoya told her, holding out his hand. As soon as she saw him outstretch his hand, she fell quiet, something Kyoya noticed. He drew his hand back. "What's wrong? Not big on handshakes? Are you a germaphobe?"

"No, it's just...I just kinda don't like shaking hands. I'm not trying to be mean."

"It's okay. I totally get it. You are new here after all. Riko, right?" Kyoya replied. _'I wonder why she's looking away from me? Maybe she's still kinda shy?'_ He secretly thought. He did notice that she didn't look directly at him.

"Yeah, I am. By the way...thanks for earlier. Y'know, for yelling at Asagi when she was making fun of me. Nobody's ever stood up for me before."

"Don't mention it. Like I said, Asagi hates everybody, even me. Nobody likes her either, so I can totally relate." The two children wanted to talk more, but the bell rang, much to their dismay.

"Awww," Riko whined.

"Yeah. Bummer. But it's okay! We can talk more next time!"

She couldn't believe her luck. Finally, she had found a potential friend! Someone who was actually nice! Someone who knew about things she liked and didn't make a big deal out of them! The celebratory butterflies in her stomach exploded into a joyful parade.

Riko was happy through the rest of the day. Finally, the bell rang, and school let out. Riko found her mother's car in front and went right in. "Ri-chan, the school told me what happened. Are you alright?" Saki asked with worry peppering her voice.

"I'm fine. I'm used to it."

"Used to it?!" Saki yelped with shock as she drove out of the parking lot and onto the road.

* * *

"Asagi-san," The principal began. "You can't keep harassing other students like this. It's not good for them or for you. Look, I know kids haven't been nice to you, but harassing them isn't going to make them change their outlook on you."

"It's not like anything else works!" Marina argued, her brows furrowing. "I've tried being nice before! It doesn't work!"

"Children can be stubborn, Asagi. We try our best to make a safe learning environment for everyone, but there will always be problems that spring up, and I don't want you to get in any more trouble than you already have," The principal told her. "I'll hold an assembly sometime soon. But please, Asagi. I don't want to see you picking on other students again. If you keep this up, I may have to take extreme measures, and believe me, I don't want to go there."

Marina didn't believe him, but she nodded before leaving the office.

* * *

Now that school was over, Riko was happy to finally be back home. But she did notice that they weren't picking Rina up. Saki told her that that was Arinao's job. But when they came inside, they were treated to an odd sight.

Sitting at the dining room table, chatting happily, were Arinao, Hikage, and a girl they had never seen before. The girl looked to be about Hikage's age, and Riko couldn't help but think she looked quite pretty. She had medium length, raven black hair tied into a long braid with a blue ribbon at the end, and shimmering blue eyes, just like Hikage's. She was wearing a white and dark blue striped shirt under an unbuttoned, short sleeved, pale blue shirt with rolled up sleeves, a pair of crimson red checked pants, and short, light brown boots. Dangling from her ears are large silver hoop earrings.

Both Riko and Saki weren't quite sure what was going on. Upon hearing their voices, Hikage flashed a smile. "Hi Mom! Hi Riko!"

Saki couldn't believe her son brought someone home with him alreadt. "Hikage...who's this girl?"

"This is my new friend, Minamigawa Hotaru! She totally saved my butt at school earlier today. I lost my school ID and schedule, but she found them and gave them back to me. I found out we share a bunch of classes together, so I thought I'd thank her by inviting her here to stay for dinner. Sorry it's so sudden," Hikage explained. "Hey Hotaru-chan, that's my mom Saki and my little sister Riko. They're super duper nice."

"It's not THAT big a deal, Hikage," Hotaru said in a humbled voice, her face turning a little red in response to Hikage's boasting. She then turned to them, smiled sweetly, and bowed a little. "It's nice to meet you both. I'm sorry to barge in like this. I won't stay long, I promise."

"Do your parents know you're here?"

"Yes. I told them over the phone," Hotaru replied kindly.

"Jeez, it's the first day and already my son has a girlfriend! And quite a pretty one too!" Arinao exclaimed jokingly, with a mischievous smirk.

"She's not my girlfriend, Dad! If she was, we'd be in our room making out by now!" Hikage snapped back, which made everybody laugh.

Riko wasn't sure if she would be welcome in something like this, so she tried to go to her room and draw, like she always does. However, she didn't get to do so, as she saw Arinao approach her with a smile on his face.

"Want to go for a walk?" Arinao asked.

Unlike other things that stopped her from drawing, walking with her dad was actually something she enjoyed. Plus, she wanted to see the neighborhood a little more, with all the pretty, multicolored flowers decking nearly every porch she saw. There were people walking their dogs, and little squirrels and rabbits hopping around...Riko smiled. "Sure! I'd love to!"

* * *

On the way home after school, Marina fought the urge to use shortcuts to hide from the angry gazes she always got from her classmates. There was always at least someone to whisper behind her back, glare at her, and tell her she was just like her father. But hiding from those people would help her feel better, since there was a conflict in her heart that wouldn't be resolved without a confrontation with those people.

So she walked past all those people sneering at her, looking down on her and not ever giving her a chance. She wouldn't fall into their traps. Not again. She kept a scowl on her face the whole time, holding her head high. Because they wouldn't change their opinion, Marina would make sure they never forgot that opinion: she would be just like her father. It wasn't like there was anything she could do to convince them otherwise.

Soon, Marina arrived at a blue and white house, with Asagi written on a flat piece of wood on the front door. She was reluctant to go in. The principal might have called her mother already, and she really didn't want to fess up. But this was her home, the only place where she could truly be herself, hide from the hatred and false assumptions of others. This was the only home, the only piece of warmth and happiness, that she truly knew after all. Quietly, she unlocked the door with her brass house key and opened the door.

"Hey Mom. I'm back," Marina murmured in a low voice, but stopped when she saw her mother unconscious on the couch, still in her gray and white office uniform. A high heel had fallen off of her left foot. The bags under her eyes darkened her face, and a wrinkle was creased into her brow. Marina smiled warmly. _'She must have had a rough day,'_ Marina thought before taking a red blanket and gently putting it over her mother.

After that, she quietly walked to the kitchen. There were quite a few dishes and coffee mugs sitting in the sink. Marina figured she could wash them, and did just that. Her mother must have had enough work to do it. She deserved a break. Once Marina finished washing the cups, she heard a yawn.

Marina turned around to find her mother with a red blanket draped around her shoulders. Her mother's caramel hair cascaded down to her upper back, and her chocolate brown eyes were still heavy with sleep, but she seemed alert enough.. "Is that you, Mari? Welcome home."

Marina continued to wash more dishes. "Hey, Mom."

"Sorry about that. I must have slept for an hour. Silly me," Her mother said, brushing her hand through her messy hair. "I can do those if you want."

Marina put a coffee mug on the rack. "That's okay. You need some rest. You probably had a rough day."

Her mother flashed a sweet smile at her, happy that Marina wanted to help her out. But her smile then morphed into a solemn expression. "Mari. There's...something we need to talk about."

Marina flinched, dropping her sponge. _'Oh no. She found out, didn't she? I knew it!'_ Marina thought fearfully, but took great pains to hide her fear. "There's nothing to talk about," She said grimly.

"Please don't lie to me, Marina," Marina knew that look all too well, and she didn't dare face her. "The school called earlier today. They said you were picking on a new transfer student and knocked a boy off his wheelchair. I thought you were better than this."

She hated being reminded of what she had done. "They deserved it! So what?!"

Her mother firmly pressed her hands onto her daughter's shoulders. "Marina! This HAS to stop! I know it's been hard for you, and I know how much you want friends. I get that, and I don't fault you for everything the other kids have been saying about you. But picking on people and bullying them isn't going to make things better!"

"It's not like anything else works, Mom! I'll always be that kid who's OBVIOUSLY going to go to jail just like her dad!" Marina shouted before storming out of the house.

"Marina!" Her mother wanted to go after her, but she then remembered that previous attempts have never worked. They usually ended in even more arguments than needed. She figured it'd be best to leave her alone to sort her feelings out.

Even bullies have problems in their lives. She flew out of the house, slammed the door behind her and took off on the sidewalk. Her breaths grew short, and she stopped, falling to her knees. Marina sobbed into her hoodie's red sleeves, salty tears burning her cheeks.

"What did I do...to deserve this?" Marina whimpered through her tears.

* * *

"Aren't you concerned about Hikage and that girl?" Riko asked as she and Arinao went out on their walk. Yumiko their Australian Shepherd puppy, accompanied them.

"Do you mean Hotaru? Hikage's fine. Saki's with them, and Hotaru seems like a very nice girl," Arinao answered. "By the way, you never did tell me how your day went."

Riko let out a sigh. "Can you _please_ stop asking me that?"

"But it's the first day."

"No. You always ask me that. You always have. My answer's always the same: I don't like school. You know how much I hate school with the force of a thousand bob cats," Riko told him rather bluntly. "Besides, you heard what happened today from Mom, didn't you? It's not like anything's going to change, even if we move."

"We all have our bad days. But didn't anything good happen? You always seem to focus so much on the negative and not on the positive. Surely something good happened," Arinao told her, trying to sound optimistic and reassuring.

Riko really couldn't find anything good about her day, other than the table she had all to herself at lunch. But nobody wanted to hear about something as silly and trivial as that. Everybody always wants the juicy stuff, the impossible stuff. But, then again…

"There is one thing…" Riko muttered softly, with a slight smile creeping on her face.

"Really? What is it-Ahh! Yumiko! Stop dragging!" Arinao felt his arm get pulled rather forcefully. Yumiko saw something and was desperately trying to run after it. But the collar rubbed against her neck and Arinao put his feet firmly in place to try and stop her, pulling her back. They stopped so Arinao could get a hold of the hyper little pup.

"There's this boy...in some of my classes. He yelled at Asagi when she picked on me. We found each other at recess, and...he knows about Hinata Sun Child. We talked, and...I don't know for sure yet, but...I think-"

"You made a new friend? That's so wonderful, sweetie! I'm so proud of you!" Arinao exclaimed happily, trapping Riko in a tight embrace once she told him, with joy bursting from his heart like he was the one who made the new friend. Riko couldn't help but find her father's loving arms to be a bit too strong, and gently pushed on his shirt in a failed attempt to pry herself out of his embrace.

"Can't...breathe…" Riko muttered, which prompted Arinao to release her. "I don't know if we're friends or not. All we did was talk. But...he was nice."

"Sorry, sweetie. It's just I know how desperate you've been to have friends and how hard it is for you to make them. I'm so proud of you! If you keep this up, you might be surprised to have finally made your first friend-guh! Yumiko! Wait!" Arinao explained until Yumiko decided to drag him away from her because she saw something she really wanted to sniff. Riko couldn't help but laugh. But she had to admit, he was right. If she played her cards right, Kyoya could be her first ever friend.

Or could he?

After chasing Yumiko and Arinao, Riko stopped when her hypersensitive ears picked up on a sound she didn't think she'd hear.

"Mew…"

"A cat?" Riko asked herself. She turned the corner and found herself speechless.

Standing in front of a bench was Marina, looking down at a box. As Riko silently looked closer, she saw Marina pick something up from it. A kitten. A very small, weak looking, but clearly alive kitten. An adorable little bundle of grey fur with darker grey stripes, frisky little whiskers, snow white paws like socks, and stunning blue eyes.

Marina was actually being kind to the little grey kitten. It'd be another story if it was another person, someone who was actually kind and nice by nature. But this was Marina, the loud girl who picked on her, knocked Kyoya out of his wheelchair, and called him Four Eyes. How could a bully who picked on people possibly be kind to animals? This was quite an alien concept to Riko, whose black and white views already dominated her very being.

"What's up, Riko?" Arinao caught up with Riko and got Yumiko under control, but he too looked toward Marina once he saw Riko staring at her rather intently. "Who is she? Do you know her? It's not polite to stare."

"That's...Asagi. The girl who picked on me." Arinao's eyes widened with surprise.

"Poor thing. I'll bet some idiot abandoned you. I'd love to take care of you, but I don't think Mom will let me. I don't blame her, considering I've been a jerk to everyone I know for the past two years," Marina told the kitten in a soft, almost kind but sad voice. Riko never heard her use that tone of voice before. In school she yelled louder than everyone else and spoke rudely to everyone, even the teachers.

Arinao was lost in thought. This was the girl who picked on his daughter? He almost couldn't believe it at first. He almost thought Riko was lying about this girl being Asagi. But he knew that Riko never lied about anything unless it was about trivial and petty stuff, like sneaking cookies from the cupboards.

"I wish I was a cat. You cats have it easy. All you do is meow, eat, run around, play with toys, chase mice, and sleep," Marina told the kitten softly, but with complete hopelessness in her quivering voice. Riko took in an inaudible breath when she saw some tears stream down Marina's cheeks, shining in the sun's light. The orange haired girl's shoulders shook a few times as she made sniveling sounds.

Riko found her heart going out to the orange haired girl. Arinao felt the same way. They couldn't help but wonder if something was bothering her, causing her to cry like this. She has to have some kind of reason. But this did tell Riko one thing: Marina wasn't all bad. If she was, she wouldn't have been so nice to that kitten.

Yumiko happened to see a squirrel scuttling across the street, and yipped a few times. "Yumiko! Shh!" Arinao bent down to Yumiko's level and cupped his hand over her snout to keep her from barking again. Unfortunately, Yumiko's barking already caught Marina's attention, and her gold eyes already fixated on Riko. She was frozen in place. Marina wanted to run. The kid she just picked on was now watching her play with a kitten, who, oddly enough, wasn't bothered by Yumiko's barking.

Marina's face turned red and she looked away, like she had been caught doing something bad."...You...you didn't see or hear anything!"

"Do you like kittens?" Riko managed to blurt out. This calmed Marina down a little.

Marina looked away sheepishly. "Yeah. So what?"

"I like kittens too. They're nice. I have two cats at home. Their names are Reese and Caroline."

"How long?"

"Huh?"

"How long were you standing there?"

"A couple minutes, I think."

"You heard everything, didn't you?"

"Kinda. We didn't mean to."

"Is your name Asagi Marina?" Arinao interjected.

"You her dad? Yeah, that's me. I picked on your kid. Just punish me and get it over with. It's not like I have anything to lose," Marina confessed, mentally preparing herself for yet another scolding.

Riko said nothing. She didn't want to make a scene.

"No. I won't yell at you or punish you. I'm sure your mother has done that already. That's what good parents do. They discipline their children and teach them right or wrong. But I don't think you're a bad person. That kitten clearly likes you, and animals have a very strong sense that tells them which people are good or bad. If that kitten likes you, then you can't be a bad person. Don't think I'm condoning what you've done to my daughter. All I want to know is...why do you pick on people?" Arinao told her in a calm voice.

Silence thickened the atmosphere except for the kitten's mewing and an occasional loud bark from Yumiko. Marina confessed with a sad, hopeless glint in her gold eyes.

"...I gave up long ago. Even if I'm nice, kids still hate me, all because they're convinced that I'm gonna be a criminal just because my dad's in jail. I figure if they treat me like a villain, then fine! Let me be a villain! It's not like I care anymore!" Marina started off soft at first, then screamed upon finishing. She took the kitten and ran away.

Arinao and Riko didn't even chase her. But Riko thought one thing: _'I don't think you'll be like him.'_

* * *

"He's gaining on us!" The light blue fairy yelled as she and her three sisters were flying over the Earth's atmosphere as fast as they possibly could. Zenjin continually shot black rays of energy at them like he was playing a game.

The fairies successfully managed to evade them all, being as small and agile as they are. But they knew they couldn't do this forever. They'd run out of energy soon. Finally, they managed to enter the Earth's atmosphere, which wasn't as hard as they expected.

"We have to stop him somehow!" The pale purple fairy exclaimed.

"But he's too powerful, Moonbeam! What are we supposed to do?!" The pink one whined.

"We have to do something! Come on, girls! Let's do it!" Sunbeam yelled.

"Die, you vermin!" Zenjin yelled as he saw the fairies stop in their tracks. This was the perfect opportunity to kill them once and for all. He fired to black rays of energy at them, but because they were so big, he couldn't see whether he successfully killed them or not.

He let his guard down right then and there.

Without warning, he was surrounded by a golden bubble of light. He tried to fly further, but he found himself ramming against a wall. He looked around to discover that he was trapped in a yellow sphere, with the four fairies surrounding it from the outside on all sides. They trapped him in a sphere-like barrier, keeping him from getting out.

"We're not letting you go to Earth, Zenjin!" The pale blue fairy shouted.

"Nobody's ever escaped our barrier, so don't even think you can even attempt to break free!" Moonbeam backed the blue fairy's claim.

"Don't let up, girls! One wrong move and the barrier will break!" Sunbeam told them.

For just a moment, Zenjin was silent and immobile, but still very much awake. However, as they tried to move the barrier, Zenjin himself was consumed by an ominous black light. Suddenly..._BOOM! _A black, fiery explosion consumed that part of the atmosphere. Shards of golden yellow glass fell far down into the Earth. The four fairies descended to the Earth like fallen angels, injured and unconscious. So did Zenjin.

* * *

"Ugh! I can't believe I told them!" Marina exclaimed as she found herself running into a little clearing in the woods with the kitten safely squirming in her hands.

Of all the people she had to run into, it just had to be the new girl she picked on earlier. But once she calmed down and caught her breath, she could feel something warm and unfamiliar embracing her broken heart, and it wasn't the furry little kitten nuzzling against her chest.

A tender glint appeared in her eyes as she watched the kitten squirm in her hands. "That's a first. They were actually nice to me," Marina whispered to herself.

"Meow!" The kitten's loud mewing pulled Marina out of her trance, and she couldn't help but smile as the kitten rubbed itself against her like it was happy to see her. _'Wow. This is the first time anyone's ever been happy to see me. Yeah, it's a cat, but...it's better than nothing, right?'_ Marina thought. She hoisted the kitten in the air.

A warm smile lit her face up. "You're a cute little thing, y'know that? Oh. You're a girl. I dunno if I'm allowed to keep you or not, but if I could adopt you, I'd name you Fern, like the girl in Charlotte's Web."

"Mew!" The kitten meowed happily, like it took a liking to the name Fern.

The trees rustled loudly right then and there. For a brief moment, Marina assumed some animals were hopping around in the trees. But a loud thud made Marina and the kitten jump a few steps back in shock because of how unusually loud it was. But Marina stiffened once she saw exactly what made the thud sound: a boy lying right in front of her, collapsed on the grass. He didn't seem to be unconscious, as he was grunting and moaning a little.

"Oww…" The boy hissed.

'_Okay...who's this kid? Why is his hair white? Why does he have a fancy crown thing on his head? And what's with the weird get-up? Is he cosplaying or something?'_ Marina thought as she clung to the kitten protectively. She didn't want to take any chances.

The boy got back on his feet, wiped some leaves off of his silvery hair and shirt, and looked around aimlessly, with a curious yet malicious glint in his eyes. Marina was unsure if she should say something or not. But it didn't matter, because without warning he turned around and noticed her.

"Umm...you okay?" Marina choked out.

"Who are you supposed to be?" The silver haired teenager sneered. "Your heart tells me you are suffering."

"Wait...what?"

"Hmph!" Then, out of nowhere, a purple orb of energy surrounded his left hand. He swung his hand at her, and the energy ball hit Marina, sending her flying out of the woods, hitting a part of a house. Marina clung to the kitten with dear life, hoping it wouldn't get hurt. Thankfully, the kitten was safe in her arms. But then something strange happened. Something popped out of Marina's body. It was a strange object that looked like a mirror with a golden rim surrounding it appeared before the boy. The middle part of the object, which should be glass, was a mass of swirling colors. As soon as Marina opened her eyes, she saw the object in front of her.

"Okay...what the freak is this thing?! And who are you?!" Marina yelped frightfully as the boy walked in front of her, his eyes fixated on the floating mirror. The kitten popped out of her arms and ran into a little bush to hide.

"Huh. Is this one of those Soul Portals I've heard so much about? Might as well check and see," The boy said to himself as he loomed in closer to Marina.

"Don't come near me, you crook!" In self-defense, she pushed the Soul Portal away and managed to punch the boy in the face so hard that he coughed up some blood. Marina got up and tried to make her escape. However, the Soul Portal was following her like a baby duckling. How was this even possible?

But the boy was not happy with this development. "You're gonna pay for that, you trash!" He roared, his eyes glowing bloody red. Out of nowhere, a red wall appeared right behind Marina, and yellow ropes wrapped around both her wrists and ankles, pulling her to the wall and keeping her there, with the Soul Portal in front. The silver haired boy caught up to Marina as she struggled to break free to no avail.

"Let me go, you idiot!" Marina pleaded as she continued to struggle against the restraints the closer the boy walked.

* * *

"_I figure if they treat me like a villain, then fine! Let me be a villain! It's not like I care anymore!"_ Marina's words continued to echo in Riko's mind as she sat in her new backyard with her sketchbooks. She was drawing a picture of a sad lime green kitten being laughed at by normal colored kittens, with angry smiles drawn on their catty faces. After a while, she stopped and thought about Marina and her confession in regards to why she picked on not just Riko, but anyone else who crossed her.

In her little heart, Riko really wanted to hate Marina, since she acted just like the kids who picked on her in her other school, but she couldn't. After hearing her confession, she just couldn't blame her for everything she'd done. Arinao and the teachers at school did a good enough job of calling her out on it.

She continued drawing to try and take her mind off of it. But it didn't work. Her motivation to draw any further seeped right out of her. She put down her lime green colored pencil and decided to put the rest of them away.

Riko decided to put her colored pencils away. "I guess everyone has people who hate them for stupid reasons."

Right then, the big dogwood tree in her backyard rustled quite loudly. Unlike Marina, however, Riko turned to look, alert and attentive. Two small objects fell out of the dogwood tree and onto the grass. One was orange, the other purple. Curious, Riko put her sketchbook down and very slowly walked over to see what they were.

At first, she thought they were stuffed animals. They were small and cute enough to resemble them. She very slowly approached one of them and decided to pick up the purple one. It looked like a cute little stuffed bunny rabbit with very soft, pale purple fur, long, straight ears with the rounded tips of them being light blue, a pale blue ribbon wrapped around its neck with a silver crescent moon on it, a silver crescent moon hair clip on its left ear, a cobalt blue crescent moon on its back, and a little tail with cobalt blue stripes and a silver crescent moon at the end of it. Both stuffed animals were so tiny that they could easily fit in each of her hands perfectly. _'What are these things, and what are they doing in my backyard?'_ Riko thought to herself. Then she noticed that there was quite a lot of fresh, red scratches on it.

Stuffed animals weren't supposed to have blood in them. Only the white stuffing.

Then, out of nowhere, the stuffed animal moved! It wiggled around a bit and opened its sterling silver eyes! Riko was trapped in an iceberg of confusion and shock, unable to move.

"What the…?" The little purple rabbit murmured in a sweet, soft voice like fur on a newborn kitten. Then it suddenly screamed, "Oh no!"

Riko, perturbed by the living stuffed animal's shouting, let go of it and covered her ears in fright. The pale purple rabbit looked around frantically as though it was looking for something. "Starbeam?! Lovebeam?! Where are you?!" It shouted desperately, like a mother whose child went missing. Then it looked down at the orange thing. "Sunbeam!"

'_Starbeam? Lovebeam? Sunbeam? What are these things?! Stuffed animals can't talk! Wait! Are they some kind of cute animal fairies? Like in those anime and manga?'_ Riko thought fearfully as she watched the desperate purple rabbit fly over to the unconscious orange thing it referred to as Sunbeam.

The little thing was a brilliant shade of orange, like the autumn leaves, with soft, plump ears that made little curls at the ends, colored sunshine yellow. It had a bright yellow sun hair clip on its left ear, with a matching accessory on its red bow. It also had a yellow sun on its back, a little tail with yellow stripes, and a matching sun at the very end of it. The purple rabbit floated onto the grass and shook her friend tearfully and shouted, "Sunbeam! Wake up! Tell me you're alright! Please! Wake up!"

This couldn't be real. Stuffed animals don't talk. This wasn't possible. But they were moving and talking, so they had to be real. Still, Riko couldn't help but feel sorry for the little rabbit. It's voice sounded genuinely desperate, and her worry for her friend was quite obvious from the way she kept pleading for her to wake up. The fear and confusion from before quickly morphed into concern. She still covered her ears because of the rabbit's shouting, but she was sure they needed someone to help them out, whatever it was they needed help with.

"Umm...are you okay?" Riko asked like she would any other person. Much to her surprise, she actually caught the little rabbit's attention. She turned around to face Riko, then gasped with shock, like she had seen a ghost.

"A-A-A-A-A human! I've been exposed!" The rabbit wailed.

"Do-Don't be afraid, little one. I'm not gonna hurt you," Riko told her as gently as she could muster, afraid to scare the poor creature further, though it must be confessed the rabbit's scream actually scared Riko quite a bit. Thankfully, it worked. The purple rabbit calmed down somewhat, though Riko could tell she was still worried about her unconscious orange friend.

"You're not? You're...not afraid of me?" The purple rabbit asked sweetly.

"No. Why would I be? You're so cute! But you do look really hurt. What happened to you?"

"Urgh…" Before the purple rabbit could answer, a moaning sound made them both turn around to see the little orange pseudo-stuffed animal trying to get itself on its feet. It rubbed its head weakly. "Oww...I feel like I just got hit by a giant tree…"

Immediately, the purple rabbit burst into tears. "SUNBEAM!"

"Wah!" The purple rabbit leaped on the orange creature so hard that she yelped and fell to the ground again, but she didn't fall unconscious this time. At first, Sunbeam seemed quite dazed. After doing a little bit of crying, the purple rabbit calmed down and released Sunbeam.

"Moonbeam...what happened?" Sunbeam inquired, her eyes still heavy with sleep. Then a light bulb flashed in her head. "Oh no! Zenjin! What happened to him?! Where is he?! Did he escape?! Where's Starbeam and Lovebeam?!" Sunbeam tried to fly away and look for them, but a jolt of pain struck her in her lower back, rendering her unable to fly. "Irk!"

"Don't push yourself so hard, Sunbeam. You're really hurt," Moonbeam told her. Sunbeam was about to tell her otherwise until she spotted Riko.

"A human! We're exposed!" Sunbeam shouted with fear, causing Riko to cover her ears in fright again.

"It's okay, Sunbeam! She's not afraid of us!" Moonbeam told her reassuringly. Sunbeam didn't look like she believed her.

"Umm...if you don't mind me asking, what happened to you? You look like you need to go to the doctor," Riko asked shyly.

"Ow!" Sunbeam croaked as she tried to move again, but pain overtook her frail little body.

"You're worse than I thought," Moonbeam murmured sadly.

"I'll go get some band-aids and ice," Riko said, running into the house. She grabbed a small pack of band-aids, and yanked a pack of ice out from the freezer. Armed with supplies, she ran back outside to find Sunbeam and Moonbeam where she left them.

"I've never done this before, so sorry if it turns out kinda sloppy," Riko pressed some band-aids on both Sunbeam and Moonbeam's many smaller scratches. She tried to be extra careful to make sure she didn't wind up making their pain worse.

After that, she put the pack of ice on Sunbeam's back, wrapped the paper towel around it, and put some tape on it to keep it in place. Soon, both Sunbeam and Moonbeam became all patched up despite the slightly messy job Riko did. "It's better than nothing, right?" Riko said once she finished.

"Thanks so much, miss...uh…" Moonbeam glowed with happiness, but she became flummoxed as she didn't know her name.

"Riko. Just Riko,"

"Thanks, Riko-chan!"

"Uhhh...you make me look like I got hacked in a blender," Sunbeam piped in.

"Sunbeam! That's not something you say to someone who helped you! Say thank you!" Moonbeam scolded, appalled by Sunbeam's lack of gratitude.

"It's alright. Don't worry about it," Riko said, looking like she actually expected that kind of response from her.

"Sorry!" Sunbeam exclaimed. "Thanks...Riko, was it? Yeah, thanks."

"Anyway...what're-" Riko was about to ask them what happened until a bloodcurdling scream caused her to cover her ears.

"Someone's in trouble! It could be Zenjin's doing!" Moonbeam exclaimed.

"Riko-chan! Come with us to see what's up!" Sunbeam shouted.

"What?! But...I've never left the house on my own before! My parents said I should never go out on my own!"

"She's right, Sunbeam. We can't drag her into this. Zenjin's too powerful," Moonbeam clarified. More screams followed.

"But we can't just sit here! Come on, Moonbeam! We've gotta stop him!" Sunbeam yelped as she darted out of Riko's arms and flew into the trees, with a reluctant Moonbeam chasing her.

Riko was left all alone in the backyard with conflicting feelings. Should she go after them? The little fairies said that they were up against someone powerful named Zenjin, and from the way they talked about him, he sure didn't sound like a nice guy. But she had never gone out on her own before, and her parents gave her strict orders not to go out at all. The yards were always the furthest she ever went in her whole entire life.

But Moonbeam and Sunbeam were tiny little flying animals, and they were injured, Sunbeam being worse off. If this Zenjin guy was really as powerful as they said he was, then there would be no possible way for them to defeat him, especially considering the extent of their injuries. Not only that, someone was obviously in trouble.

"AAAAGH! I can't just sit here! I'm going in!" Riko screamed before running past the dogwood tree into the direction she remembered seeing them go in.

It didn't take long for her to catch up to Moonbeam and Sunbeam, as their injuries made them rather slow and unsteady. As soon as they found the source of the screaming, they hid behind some trees, horrified by what they witnessed.

Marina was strapped to a giant wall.

She was screaming. Protesting. Struggling for her life.

Someone was looking into a mirror-like object.

"That's Zenjin! What's he doing?!" Moonbeam tried really hard to lower her voice so Zenjin didn't notice her.

'_That's Zenjin?'_ Riko thought.

"Wait...no! Is he looking into her...Soul Portal? The ones the Queen always told us about?!" Sunbeam yelped fearfully.

Riko couldn't believe what she was seeing. _'What the-?! Why's that guy hurting Asagi?! What is he doing to her?!'_ From the way Marina screamed and struggled and writhed like a worm, she looked like she was in a lot of pain. Zenjin, pulled his face out of her Soul Portal. Marina stopped screaming. She struggled to keep herself awake despite the pain.

"What was...that all about?!" Marina croaked, giving Zenjin a blazing glare.

"I've seen all I need to see about you. Your dreams, your desires, your insecurities, your suffering, your deepest, darkest secrets, your most private thoughts, everything else," Zenjin told her in a low voice. Then, with his crimson eyes blazing with hate, he unabashedly...spat at her. A glob of spit fell on her face. In retaliation, she spat at him, but it wasn't in range, so it just fell on the concrete.

"You're pathetic, you trash! How dare you be so arrogant as to think you've got it bad!" Zenjin roared as raising his hand in the air. "Let me be the one to show you...my suffering is far greater than yours will ever be!"

Without hesitation, he drove his hand into the Soul Portal, causing Marina to scream louder and harder than ever before. She felt as though her entire body, her entire being, was being violated and ripped apart from the inside and out. The feeling was worse than before. No amount of words could possibly describe the pain she was in.

"I can't watch!" Moonbeam squeezed her eyes shut and covered them with her long ears.

At first, Riko was scared, but after seeing what Zenjin was doing, her fear turned into courage. She was appalled. No, more than appalled. Downright horrified. How could this Zenjin guy be so cruel to someone? It didn't matter if the person he was hurting was someone who picked on her for kicks. Yes, she did deserve some punishment, but not if it meant hurting them to such a horrible extent, possibly killing her, if whatever he was doing to her _could_ kill her. What did she do to him that was so bad?

A flame of courage exploded in her heart. Riko couldn't stand by and watch her suffer anymore.

"Wait! No!" Sunbeam yelled.

Zenjin smiled wickedly as he was about to pull his hand out from Marina's Soul Portal...

"Leave her alone!" Riko successfully rammed herself against him, pushing him off of Marina. What she didn't know was that in Zenjin's hand is an orange orb that was very slowly turning black, like a rotting egg. The wall and restraints holding Marina disappeared, causing her to slump to the ground.

Marina lay there, dormant, with her wide eyes still open. She looked deathly pale. Neither Zenjin nor Riko noticed.

"Get off me, you insolent piece of trash!" Zenjin tried to force Riko off of him with his hands, but she just wouldn't relent. They hissed, hit, kicked, bit, and struggled until Riko managed to slash a part of Zenjin's face with her long fingernails, drawing some blood.

That's when Zenjin snapped.

"YOU SLASHED MY FACE!" Zenjin fired a black and purple beam of energy at Riko, causing her to be thrown against a tree. Like Marina before her, she slumped to the ground, too injured to react.

"Riko-chan!" Both Moonbeam and Sunbeam exclaimed with horror. There was no way Riko could deal with him.

Zenjin walked over to the injured Riko with a very stern and angry look on his face, not realizing that the orange and black orb he yanked out of Marina's Soul Portal has fallen out and rolled onto a part of the street. Riko saw him coming toward her and she tried to get away, but her injuries hindered her attempts to do so.

Nobody was prepared for what he would do next.

Without any mercy, Zenjin lifted up one of his feet and viciously kicked Riko against the tree. Riko cried out in pain, but it didn't end. Zenjin kicked the helpless girl once more. Twice. Thrice. Four times. If someone saw him doing this right then and there, they'd have Zenjin be thrown in jail.

"You're trash! You don't deserve to exist, you trash! You're born trash and you will die trash!" Zenjin yelled as he continued kicking her without any hint of guilt or remorse.

"Get off me!" Riko shouted as she suddenly evaded Zenjin's leg and pushed him to the ground.

"Leave her alone!" Moonbeam wailed, clutching her ears.

"We've gotta help that girl!" Sunbeam exclaimed, pointing to the unconscious, dormant Marina.

But before they could do anything, the orange orb that Zenjin successfully yanked out of Marina finally turned black. An eerie black light enveloped it, shining so bright that it blinded everyone at the scene. The glowing orb grew bigger, and bigger, and bigger until it was about the size of an elephant. Riko was disgusted to see that the more Zenjin stared at the glowing light, the more he smiled like a mad scientist.

"Yes! Yes! YES! I've actually corrupted a human's soul! I wonder if I turned it into some super cool monster or something!" Zenjin exclaimed like he had just won a prize at a festival. Riko couldn't believe someone could display such sociopathic, guiltless glee at seeing someone suffer.

Once it had reached the size of a tall tree, the light dissipated and out came...a big, black, red eyed fox with long ears, a long nose, a long tail, and slender legs. The gigantic fox was entirely black save for its eyes. Once Zenjin saw the creature, he spat at the ground.

"Pheh! I expected something cooler and more threatening!" Zenjin sneered, disgusted by the fox's appearance.

'_Wait! He enjoys watching people suffer and expects his creation to be perfect, and then decides it's not worth his time?! Seriously, this guy's a psycho!'_ Riko thought. She couldn't help but wonder how she was even able to remotely comprehend everything that had been going on. But fear overtook her once again as the gigantic fox almost stepped on her. She would have been squashed like a bug had she not run for her life.

The fox's large size was already enough to make Riko more scared than she had ever been. "What's with the giant fox?!"

"We don't know! This is the first time we've ever seen something like this!" Moonbeam exclaimed.

"RUUUUN!" Sunbeam yelled as the fox tried to step on them again.

With a swish of its tail, it knocked some trees over, sending them spiraling down to the ground, one of them destroying a part of a house. Then, it swung at another house, turning it into a pile of rubble. Riko found herself, Sunbeam, and Moonbeam hiding behind a tree. She was covering her ears and shaking violently, unable to move.

"We've gotta stop that thing!" Sunbeam yelled.

"But we're powerless! We don't even know what it is, nor what its capable of!" Moonbeam argued, her eyes trembling wirh fear.

Riko couldn't say anything. She was shaking like a leaf. The noises were attacking her all at once, and she was powerless to block them out. People screaming, houses being destroyed, trees being knocked down, the ground shaking, the sound of the fox's steps, the foxes anguished roars, it was as though she was being swamped by a tsunami of noise.

"Make it stop...make it stop...please...no more…too loud..." Riko muttered sadly, like she was about to burst into tears at any moment.

Then she heard something else. A voice. A voice she knew.

"_Is it really so freaking bad?!"_

Riko's eyes flew open, and she found herself able to move again. She stood up and peeked from behind the tree, wondering if the muffled cries were what she truly thought they were.

"Did you guys hear that?" Riko asked the fairies.

"Yeah, we did!" Sunbeam nodded to empathize her answer.

"_Yes. It's true. My dad did do something bad...but why blame it all on me?! I'm not him! You wonder why I'm mean to people, because THEY'RE mean to ME!"_ A choked voice bellowed in a sad tone, like it was about to burst into tears.

Then it hit Riko.

Marina said something similar.

"_Why does everyone think I'm going to grow up to be him no matter what?! Why can't they understand and see me for who I am?! Why won't they listen to me?! Why does everyone think I'm bad?! What did I ever do...to deserve this?!"_

Riko uncovered her ears. "That fox...could it be...Asagi?"

Yet another tsunami of courage overtook her, and she suddenly ran toward the gigantic fox, not realizing that Zenjin was watching the fox wreak havoc with glee. "Sure! Even if you're trash, you still do a good job at wrecking everything!" Zenjin laughed like he was watching a comedy show.

"ASAGI!" With her hands covering her ears, Riko stood in front of the giant fox without a hint of visible fear. The fox was so busy knocking a tree over that it completely ignored her.

Zenjin did not like this development. "Hey! Get outta my way! I wanna watch this!"

"She can't be serious!" Moonbeam yelled from afar.

"Asagi! Please don't do this! Zenjin or whoever that silver haired guy is corrupted you! I don't hate you because of your dad! I never even heard of him! I only hated you because you were mean to me and Kyoya! So what if your dad's a bad person?! So what if everyone thinks you're gonna be him?! Screw them! You're not him, and they shouldn't expect you to be him either! They don't know you!" Riko yelled as loud as she could. The fox turned around to look at her.

"_They don't know me...yet they act like they do. They always act like they know everything about me when they really don't! I hate that!"_ The fox said.

"I totally get that! Believe me, Asagi! I know what it's like to be hated by everyone for something you can't control! But don't do this! It'll just make people hate you even more! You don't want that, do you?!"

Moonbeam and Sunbeam watched from afar, surprised that Riko is standing her ground against the gigantic fox, completely unarmed and vulnerable. It was likely Riko didn't even know the first thing about fighting or how to defend herself. But despite being completely vulnerable and powerless, Riko still had it in her heart to at least try and talk to the giant black fox.

Out of nowhere, one of the Heart Lighters that Queen Malgorzata had given them earlier suddenly appeared right in front of Moonbeam. The purple Heart Lighter to be more precise. Then, out of nowhere, the purple, star shaped perfume bottle glowed in a radiant purple light.

"Wha-What's happening?!" Sunbeam yelped with surprise. "Open it!"

On command, Moonbeam twisted the heart shaped cap, opening the bottle, allowing the light to leave. The brilliant ball of energy flew right in front of Riko as though it was drawn to her, like it knew her. The light shone brightly in front of Riko, causing her to cover her eyes due to its sheer radiance. "Too bright!"

Sunbeam figured it out right away. This could only mean one thing. "What the...the Heart Lighter's reacting to her!"

"The Queen said...the Heart Lighters only react to those whose hearts resonate with them…" Moonbeam said. With a courageous look on her purple little face and the Heart Lighter in her arms, she flew over to Riko, who is still covering her eyes. "Riko-chan! Grab the light!"

"Why?!"

"Just do it!"

"Okay okay!" Riko snapped as she grabbed the light in with one of her hands while squeezing her eyes shut. Then, as soon as she grabbed it, it disappeared. Riko opened her eyes and looked at what she caught in her hand. Much to their surprise, the light turned into an extremely tiny purple heart object with a cotton candy pink cat face on it. Then, the Heart Lighter itself glowed in a purple light. Only for a little bit though. A huge chunk of the perfume bottle disappeared, leaving a hollow hole on it shaped like a heart.

"Riko-chan! Put that little jewel onto the hole here!" Moonbeam said as she floated toward Riko to show her the Heart Lighter.

Riko, without any hesitation or fear at all, did as asked. As soon as she did it, a purple light shone brightly from the Heart Lighter, much brighter than anything else before it, causing Moonbeam to hand it to Riko. Not only that, it was much bigger, and it completely enveloped Riko.

Riko didn't have any time to react, or even scream, as she got completely swallowed up by the purple light. But as soon as she woke up, words suddenly came into her mind.

"Pretty Cure, let the light shine!" She shouted, holding the Heart Lighter in the air. The heart object dissolved into the perfume bottle, filling it with a kind of translucent lavender liquid.

Riko twirled around, spraying the sparkling perfume all over herself. She donned a sleeveless purple shirt with a lacy white border going vertically down her chest, with little dark violet diamonds decorating it. A matching ribbon appeared on her chest, with an accessory shaped like a diamond on it in a lighter tint. Two lace bordered armbands wrapped snugly around her shoulders. She also had on a pair of shorts the same color as her ribbon, along with a small shawl like cloth going around her waist, secured by a belt with a diamond decoration on it. Her shoes went up to her ankles, with little white angel wings flapping up and down. Her black hair turned a sweet shade of dark violet. A set of purple and pink cat ears grew out from her head, and a tail with light blue stripes popped out from underneath the shawl around her waist. Fingerless gloves covered both of her hands, and a dark purple diamond marked her forehead. The Heart Lighter dangles from her shawl like a keychain. Soon, the light dissipated, bringing her back to Earth.

Moonbeam and Sunbeam couldn't help but stare in awe at Riko's spectacular transformation. "She's one of them! She's a Pretty Cure!" Sunbeam shouted with delight.

"What the…?" Riko muttered in shock once she got a good look at herself. "Umm...why am I cosplaying? Why is my hair purple? Oh! Wait!" Riko exclaimed, smiling upon noticing the cat ears and tail. "I must have transformed into some kind of superhero! I have cat ears and a tail! Just like Twilight Cat! Yeehee!" Riko cheered, jumping up and down like a happy fangirl. "Oh, but I'm not really Twilight Cat, am I?"

"You're a Pretty Cure now, Riko-chan!" Moonbeam told her cheerfully.

"A...Pretty Cure? Like the anime?" Then something else dawned on her. "But...but I don't know how to fight at all! I can't defend myself to save my life! What if I end up destroying everything?! I might mess up more than I resolve things! Meow!" She panicked hysterically. Her cat ears twitched in response to her realization.

Before the fairies could reply, Zenjin laughed maliciously as he sat on a tree watching everything. "Bwahahaha! God, you were trashy before, but now you're even trashier than ever!"

"Oh shut up, Zenjin!" Sunbeam yelled.

Riko couldn't believe what was going on. Fairies, energy balls, giant mirrors, a black fox...this was all too much to take in. None of this could be real. For a moment, she thought she was watching an anime. But she felt, heard, and saw everything with all her senses. She wanted to cry, but she refrained from doing so. There were far more important matters at hand, and crying wouldn't solve them one bit.

_'I'm not sure if I can be a good hero. I'll probably do more harm than good...but someone's gotta stop this Zenjin guy and help Asagi. I can't just stand by and watch. People could die. Someone's gotta step up,'_ Riko thought as she stood in front of the fox again.

"Halt, ginormous fox! Poor soul, you have been consumed by darkness and are suffering. Fear not, for your suffering ends here! Meow!" Riko edicted proudly, like any superhero would, though she had to wonder if it sounded forced. "I am the light that will brighten up your world!" She struck a pose, making her hands look like cat paws. "Cure Twilight!"


	2. What Happened? Riko Gathers Intel!

Chapter 2: What happened? Riko Gathers Intel!

Not once did Riko think anything like this could ever happen to her.

She dreamed of becoming someone everyone could admire, like a super cool magical girl with a magic wand or a super hero saving damsels in distress, or at least someone who could do something good and be liked for it, but she always thought the possibility of all of those things ever happening was pretty much below negative infinity to her.

Yet, here she was, transformed into a magical girl heroine just like in her favorite manga and anime, fighting a monster who happens to be the manifestation of Marina's insecurity and suffering, created by some crazy white haired psychopath kid (who she could tell was Hikage's age) who takes massive sociopathic glee in making people suffer. She's the hero, he's the villain, and as far as she could comprehend, it was now her responsibility to make sure the monster is contained and that the people in her town are safe. There was no way in Heaven or Hades that Riko was dreaming. She touched everything with her own hands. She felt their solidity. She saw everything with her own eyes. Her senses are sensitive, so she would have been able to tell if they were real or not.

She wanted to think some more, but the voices of a very quickly amassing crowd dragged her out of her reverie.

"Whoa! What's that giant fox thing?"

"And who's that girl in purple?"

"Record this, will you?!"

"It's too dangerous! She needs to get away!"

"Is that fox gonna eat us?"

"We gotta run for the hills, pal!"

"Tell me they're filming some kind of movie."

"What movie is this?"

"Does this LOOK like a movie to you?! I don't see any cameras or a film crew around, do you?!"

"Someone call the police, my God!"

"Don't we need to evacuate?"

"Why does she have cat ears and a tail? This isn't a costume party!"

Their voices unknowingly attracted the fox's attention, who decided they were annoying in the form of attempting to squash them with it's tail.

"No!" Riko yelled. She found herself flying toward the crowd faster than she could normally do on her own. She stood in front of the frightened crowd and vigorously grabbed hold of the two tails. She was surprised she could even grab them at all, let alone be strong enough to hold it off. Not only that, she realized she was actually standing her ground against something that weighs much more than she does.

'_Okay, how the heck am I able to stand here and cling to this thing without getting thrown around? I'm supposed to be scrawny and weak!'_ But she knew she couldn't focus on the changes happening to herself.

"Everyone!" She yelled as she turned toward the awestruck but frightened crowd. "Run away from here as fast as you can! I'll handle things here! Hurry and get away!" She felt unsure of that last part, but someone had to do something. Why couldn't she?

"You heard the purple girl! Let's move it!" One woman said as she grabbed her child and ran from the chaotic scene as fast as she could. So did over people. Riko exhaled a sigh of relief knowing that the people know to run from a dangerous situation.

As soon as the crowd dispersed, Riko found herself being lifted into the air. The fox was lifting its tail. With a swish, Riko found her grip gone, and she found herself flying toward a tree. "YEEEK! I'm flying! Somebody get me dooown!" She screamed in a panic, unable to stop herself. She feared she would break all of her bones, but then her legs moved on their own, and her feet made contact with the bark on a branch. She wobbled and struggled to maintain her balance, but in the end, she didn't fall.

"Whoa whoa whoa! Phew! I survived! But I wish I had some kind of weapon or attacks or something!" Riko murmured to herself as she leaped onto another branch like a bob cat. Then, much to her surprise, a long set of starkly silver, shining, razor sharp claws appeared from her purple gloves. "Whoa! Claws!" She exclaimed with shock as they appeared. But there was no time to be shocked.

"_They can all die for all I care! They think I'm gonna be just like him, so I might as well give them all what they've been clamoring for!"_ The fox, Marina, croaked as it ran toward Riko, who oddly enough, wasn't afraid at all.

"Be careful, Riko-chan!" Moonbeam advised.

With a majestic leap, Riko leaped toward the giant fox with her claws out and ready to slash. "Cat Slash!" As soon as she came close enough to the fox's face, with great speed, she slashed and scratched and hacked at the fox's face. The fox hissed and howled as it found its face covered with scratches.

"Twilight Kick!" Extending her right leg out and folding her left one, she gave the giant black fox a kick so strong that it actually fell onto at least three houses, destroying them and knocking over quite a few trees. Once she got back onto the ground, with her ears covered due to the noise, she couldn't help but yelp at the destruction she unknowingly caused.

"Ack! Sorry! I didn't mean to do that! I...I hope everyone's alright! Nobody's in them, right?" Riko asked fearfully, her eyes full of guilt and worry for knocking the giant fox onto those houses. But what scared her even more was whether people were inside. If they were...she didn't want to fear the worst. She hoped the worst didn't happen. If it happened, she'd have to go to jail, and more than anything, she did not want to go to jail.

"I'll go check," Sunbeam said as she went to examine the destruction. After a couple minutes, she came back out. "Nobody's inside, so you're good!"

Riko exhaled a sigh of relief. "Phew. I'm glad. But why did I manage to leap so high? I usually never go that high. Ever. And how am I able to sit on a branch without falling? And why am I suddenly stronger than usual? Or better yet, why am I strong at all?!"

"Hurry up and purify the monster! If you do, Marina will be back to normal!" Moonbeam exclaimed. "Oh! Check those pockets on the shawl around your waist!"

"Do you mean these?" Riko asked as she rummaged her hand through her left pocket and pulled something out. A small, purple, circle shaped object with a big hollow cavity, with a gold stripe going all around it and a pink, glittering, heart shaped jewel on the bottom part, which soon grew to the size of Riko's sketchbook as soon as she pulled it out. "How do I use this?"

"All we know about the Pretty Cure's weapons is that you have to concentrate all of your energy into purifying the monster," Moonbeam explained.

"I don't quite get it, but someone's gotta do something, and I'm here now, so I might as well get this done and over with!" Riko exclaimed as she listened to Moonbeam's explanation.

Zenjin, who continued to watch from atop a tree, laughed like he was watching Comedy Central, only the situation going on around him was not funny at all. Especially not to Riko, the two fairies, and everyone else who evacuated the scene. "Do you seriously believe a piece of trash like you can purify my creation?! Oh, my ribs are killing me! You're way over your head, trash!"

"Oh shut up, you psycho!" Riko snapped.

"You shut up!" Zenjin snapped back petulantly.

"I don't have time for this," Riko said in an exasperated tone, annoyed by Zenjin's malice and callousness. She walked over to the fox, who proceeded to knock over more trees with its tail this time. Riko's eyes and heart were ablaze with courage, showing not one little spec of fear.

"Asagi Marina! You don't need to do this anymore! It's okay to be sad about what you went through and to hate everyone! It's natural to take your anger out on them, even though it's not a good way to deal with it! You don't deserve to be hated because your dad's an idiot! I know you're not him! You're way better than he'll ever be! But causing all of this destruction isn't going to make things better!" Riko yelled.

"_So? It's not like anything else worked! I gave up long ago!"_ The fox snapped back angrily. _"There's no hope for me!"_

"Yes there is! Let me help you! Let me...bring the light back in your heart!" Riko exclaimed.

She held the giant purple ring in the air and yelled in a booming voice, "Lend me your strength, holy light!" The purple ring glowed, and she pressed her hand on the heart, causing it to glow. "Twilight Ring, Power Up!" She yelled as she gripped her giant ring with both hands.

"You needn't suffer anymore. The corrupting darkness will be banished, and the light in your heart will shine again! Twilight Serenade!" With that, a large ray of purple light shot out from the ring and completely consumed the giant fox that was Marina's insecurity and suffering. The lavender hued light consumed the fox in the shape of a tornado. It swirled around rapidly, like a fast moving whirlpool. The fox itself turned white, and then dissolved into nothing but a white light. The purple tornado dissipated, and out came a white light which floated into Riko's hands. As soon as it made contact with her tender palms, the white light faded to reveal an orange glass orb with a white light glowing faintly inside of it.

"This must be what he yanked out of Asagi," Riko said.

"Careful! That's her soul he yanked out. Be EXTREMELY careful with it, as it's very fragile. If it breaks, the person it belongs to will die!" Moonbeam told her.

"Can't have that happen, now can we?" Riko asked as she very carefully walked over to the unconscious Marina, her Soul Portal still exposed, hoping to not drop the extremely fragile orb she's holding. She withdrew her claws before she used the Twilight Ring so she didn't have to worry about them breaking it. The kitten mewed at her to wake up, to no avail. Riko couldn't help but find it surprising that the helpless little kitten stayed with Marina this whole time, like it was her bodyguard despite being so weak and vulnerable itself. She had to wonder why it didn't run away from all the commotion going on, as kittens are normally very scared of things like that. Hissing at them from afar, Zenjin teleported away, disappointed by this very unexpected and irritating outcome.

But as soon as she got close, she very slowly and gently let the orange orb fall into the Soul Portal. When it fell in, the Soul Portal faded away. But much to everyone's relief, the color in Marina's face returned, and her goldenrod eyes peeled right open as soon as the Soul Portal disappeared. Even Riko couldn't help but feel an intense tsunami of relief consume her. _'She's okay! Thank God! I'm so glad I saved her in time!'_ Riko thought as Marina pulled herself up, feeling her head throb.

"Ugh...what happened to me…?" Marina groaned as she woke up, placing a hand on her forehead like she's having a migraine. Then the memories of being attacked by Zenjin came back into her mind. "Oh! Now I remember! Some white haired idiot attacked me and this mirror thing came out of me and he said something about how his suffering's greater than mine and-and-and…" Then she looked at Riko, still Cure Twilight, her gold eyes wide with confusion, flummoxed by the presence of a purple cat girl in her midst. "Who are you?"

"You're right. Someone attacked you. But don't worry. I drove him off so he won't hurt you anymore," Riko told her calmly. However, on the inside, her insides were doing back flips and she wanted to run away. She didn't dare show these insecurities though, as she figured it'd make Marina feel unsafe. She then stood up and crossed her arms proudly. "Anyway, I'm the hero Cure Twilight. I admit, I'm just a newcomer, but if you ever need my help, feel free to give me a call!"

Marina smiled as though she was about to laugh at her, which embarrassed Riko a bit until it turned out she wasn't going to laugh after all. "Thanks for saving me, Cure Twilight or whatever. But you kinda need to work on your power control," She piped in, noticing the destroyed houses and the trees that fell on the street rather haphazardly.

Riko was about to ask what she meant until she looked around and noticed the destroyed houses. "I know. I totally didn't mean to do that."

Moonbeam and Sunbeam, who hid in the same tree Zenjin did just after he teleported, watched with exasperation. "Awww! She just had to go and tell her she's Cure Twilight! She's such a loudmouth!" Sunbeam complained.

"But Asagi doesn't seem to know she's Riko, so it should work out so long as she doesn't find out who she really is. Besides, other people have seen her, so I don't think it'll matter either way," Moonbeam told her exasperated sister reassuringly, glad to see some good in this weird situation.

Riko turned around, only to freeze when her eyes met with those of some very surprised townspeople. Immediately, her cheerful expression was replaced with that of fear. _'Oh no! They're looking at me with weird faces! Do they...hate me?' _Just what was on their faces? Fear? Hatred? Surprise? All Riko knew was that she didn't like it. Consumed by fear, she ran away from the scene. Marina did the same.

"Man, that was awesome!" A kid shouted exuberantly. "That girl totally beat that monster down! Is she a super hero or something?"

"Shh! We're going home now, Kanba!" The kid's mother exclaimed as she dragged her excited son away from the scene.

But what Riko didn't know was that far away from the townspeople, hiding behind a tree that was still standing, was Minamigawa Hotaru, who watched the entire scene with a strangely calm kind of surprise.

Yes, she saw everything.

* * *

In another dimension not of this world, surrounded by pitch black darkness, with a couple little stars twinkling here and there, a floating fortress that was completely grey, black, white, and red floated aimlessly in the spacial cavity, with no destination in sight. Zenjin appeared and walked inside, heading for his headquarters, which was actually his room. Midnight blue walls, a golden table with shiny gold chairs with comfy red cushions, a black bed with a white canopy dangling over it like a bride's veil, and gray pillows donned the room, looking extremely gaudy and out of place in this sterile environment. Zenjin plopped onto his canopy bed, annoyed by how much he embellished it and Cure Twilight's unexpected interference.

"Gah! That purple girl just HAD to get in my way! Those fairies and that kid are gonna pay for crossing me, the great and all powerful Zenjin!" Zenjin exclaimed petulantly, like a little kid who didn't get dessert. But once he magically healed the scar on his face with his newly acquired powers and calmed down, he ruminated about what just happened.

"Those creatures...they're my creation, aren't they?" Zenjin asked himself in a low whisper. Then he sat up on his bed with his legs crossed in a pretzel style and donned a big smile on his face. "I see! I created those monsters, and since I have the honor of creating them, I should come up with a name for them!"

It didn't take long for him to come up with one. It appeared right on the tip of his tongue.

"Human Trash. Yes, that's PERFECT! The Human Trash!" Zenjin laughed as he said the name he decided to give to his new creations. "So this is also what the Energia can do, huh? Awesome! Not only can I destroy worlds, I can turn people's suffering against them and make them into pariahs! Ha! That'll teach them to think they have it worse than me!" He exclaimed boldly.

"Oh wait! But then again, I don't know if my power is limitless or not, so I should try testing it out some more just to see if my creations vary in shape with every soul I corrupt. This should be a nice little experiment after destroying 80% of that stupid saccharine land called Rozaniela," A dark, malicious smile formed on his pale face. "I can finally show these pieces of trash what it's like to REALLY suffer and feel like the entire world is against them! And if I'm ready, I might even be able to...track her down and give her the comeuppance she oh so deserves!"

* * *

Thankfully for Riko, as soon as she stepped into her backyard, her Pretty Cure outfit disappeared, and she was back in her normal clothes. She ran into the house and zipped into her room as quickly as she could. The sky was just beginning to turn orange so she wasn't out late. Once she made it to her room, she plopped onto her bed and buried her face in her soft, fluffy pillows and stuffed animals. Oh, how she yearned to cuddle something soft, fuzzy, tender, and sweet.

"Thank God, it's over!" Riko said, feeling more exhausted than she ever felt before, her voice muffled by the pillows. Moonbeam floated over to Riko with a concerned look on her face, noticing that she looked sad.

"You were awesome out there. Yeah, you did do it a little haphazardly and you should have handled your powers a bit better, but you at least stopped Asagi's spirit from destroying everything else and killing everybody. Great job!" Moonbeam told her reassuringly.

But Riko's reaction wasn't anything that the two fairies expected. They heard whimpering...which soon ballooned into full blown crying.

Riko wailed into her pillow passionately, muffling her loud, heartbroken cries. Sunbeam and Moonbeam looked at each other with confused faces, surprised by Riko's reaction.

"What's wrong? You saved everyone!" Sunbeam asked worriedly, stupefied.

"They hate me! They all do! They must think I'm some weirdo who destroyed everything! I should never have expected it to be different here!" Riko wailed into her pillow, allowing her tears to make dark, wet marks on the pillow case.

"Don't be sad, Riko-chan! What makes you think that? I don't think they're mad at you," Sunbeam told her reassuringly, becoming quite cowed by Riko's passionate crying and pessimism.

"Yes they are. I saw it on their faces. They're gonna hate me forever," Riko cried.

"Yeah, well, if they do, that's their problem! Yeah, you did kinda go overboard and destroyed those houses, but nobody was in them, so their lives are safe! Besides, it's not like you wanted to kick the fox into them, now did you?" Sunbeam exclaimed audaciously.

"No. But the fact that I destroyed them at all makes me stupid!" Riko snapped.

"You're not stupid! Zenjin's the one who's stupid! He's the one who hurt Asagi and turned her soul into that fox creature. He's done far worse," Moonbeam explained calmly. She had a rough day. They've all had one. "But you saved everyone, and that's good."

"Ugh! That Zenjin! I oughta punch his lights out! We went through all that trouble of raising him on Rozaniela, yet he just ups and destroys it! He needs to be held accountable for what he's done. I knew something was up when he wasn't responding to our love and care...but to think he'd go this far...and we never noticed!" Sunbeam shouted angrily, with a twinge of rue peppering her voice. "I wish we had seen this coming! Then we would have been able to stop him from stealing the Energia and everything else!"

"None of us saw it coming, Sunbeam, so we're all at fault here. Don't blame yourself. We don't know what he's planning for this world, and we can't do much about it now, especially in our condition. Let's rest for a while so we can at least have enough energy to go out and find Starbeam and Lovebeam. Besides, I think Riko needs some time alone to have a good cry. Don't you think?" Moonbeam told her sister kindly but sadly.

Sunbeam could tell that even she was sad about everything that happened. But what could they have done? They're just tiny little stuffed animal-like fairies. Zenjin has all the power in the world, and he could easily defeat them. That, and they really needed some rest.

"You're right. Let's hang around here for a while," Sunbeam said as she hid underneath Riko's bed. Moonbeam followed suit.

"Be sure to be quiet when people come in. Riko's family might be frightened when they see stuffed animals talking and walking and flying. They might think we're trying to hurt them," Moonbeam told her.

"I know, I know," Sunbeam said as she retreated further under the bed. "Still, I can't believe Riko's a Pretty Cure. Exactly what makes a person capable of becoming one? I wonder if we'll finally find out."

"We'll just have to wait and see," Moonbeam said.

It took about fifteen minutes for Riko to stop crying, which was admittedly rather surprising to Moonbeam and Sunbeam, as they expected Riko to go on for a lot longer, like one or two hours. During that time, Riko cried out all of her sadness.

She wished she wasn't so stupid, clumsy, and incompetent. She wished she did a better job at actually saving the town from Marina's corrupted soul. She wished she could be a good hero, not someone who messes up all the time. True, this was her first time, so a little failure was to be expected, but Riko's so used to failure and everyone berating her for whatever she failed at to the point of making her cry that she had to wonder if she was even capable of doing anything perfectly right at all. Soon, her chest began to hurt from too much crying. She fell silent for a while, and then grudgingly pulled her head out of her tear soaked pillow. She found she left some huge marks on it, but who cares? It was her pillow, so she could do whatever she wanted with it.

Once she pulled herself up and sat on her bed, questions raced through her mind. Who was this Zenjin guy? Why is he so cruel? Is he an alien? Why does he take such sociopathic glee in making someone suffer and show absolutely no guilt or remorse for what he's done? Shouldn't he be held accountable for his actions? Why did corrupting Marina's soul turn it into a gigantic, frightening, pitch black fox creature the size of a full grown elephant? What's a Soul Portal? Why does someone's soul look like one of those glass balls clairvoyants use when telling fortunes? How was she able to become a Pretty Cure? What exactly is a Pretty Cure anyway? She knew it was an anime, and she had even seen a few of the series, including a few episodes of the new one that's airing right now, but she never expected to become one, not even in her wildest dreams. Pretty Cure are supposed to be fiction. Why has she become one? And how in the world did she manage to jump ten feet in the air and punch and kick that giant fox like she was a pro when she's supposed to be too weak to even jump higher than a foot or punch a punching bag, or even a pillow?

Her thoughts were immediately interrupted by Saki coming into the room. "Riko-chan! Dinner's ready," Saki told her.

"Okay. Thanks," Riko said. As soon as she said that, she heard a rumbling sound coming straight from her abdomen. Perhaps fighting Marina's corrupted soul really sapped the energy out of her. Riko was certainly hungry, so she decided to go down and eat dinner.

It's a good thing Saki made something she liked: salisbury steak with rice pilaf and corn. There were green beans too, but she doesn't like them. Hotaru, still at the house, told the Tasogare family about something funny that happened when she was little, and they laughed like she was already a member of the family.

But something about this raven haired girl made Riko feel a little tense. For some reason or another, Hotaru often glanced at Riko like she suspected she was hiding something. Normally, Riko was averse to eye contact, but she can tell when someone's staring at her in a way she doesn't like. She couldn't quite understand why, though. Does Hotaru like her? Or does she not? Riko didn't want to think about that.

She did, however, suspect that Moonbeam and Sunbeam might be hungry. _'I bet they must be starving. Once I finish up, I'll bring them some leftovers. They've had it rough, so they deserve it. But how am I gonna get past Rina? As soon as I get out of here, she's gonna yell at me about something!'_ Riko thought as she chomped on her favorite rice pilaf.

"Aww! I don't wanna eat green beans! They're yucky!" Rina complained loudly.

"Don't be picky, Rina-chan. Green beans are actually good for you. They'll make you big and strong," Hikage told her with a mischievous smile on his face to lighten up the situation.

"How do you know?" Rina asked, not convinced.

"I agree. Green beans aren't the tastiest food to eat. Y'know, when I was little, when my parents would make me eat potatoes, I would sneak them into my shoes and then throw them all out once I finished the rest of my dinner. But then my dad found out and lectured me like crazy on how potatoes are good for me and how I should never be so sneaky," Hotaru told them with a sweet smile on her face.

Arinao and Saki burst into hearty laughter once again. "I remember when I was a girl, my parents wouldn't let me leave the table until I finished eating beets, and I still hate beets with the fury of a thousand suns," Saki told them through her laughter.

"I have to say, Hikage, your new friend sure knows how to leave us in stitches," Arinao told his jovial son once he calmed down.

"Some kids used to call me stitches when I was in 5th and 6th grade," Hotaru said.

Riko thought this was the perfect opportunity to sneak some food on her plate and run back to her room to give it to Moonbeam and Sunbeam so they can at least have something to eat and replenish their energy. "How come I have to eat green beans while Riko doesn't?!" Rina suddenly asked, which made Riko freeze for a bit.

"Riko's already a big girl. Now eat your beans, Rina. They're good for you, and don't put your elbows on the table. That's bad manners," Saki told her youngest daughter firmly.

"That's not fair! Hey, Riko! Come back to the table! It's rude to run to your room while people are here!" Rina yelled.

"I'm already done dinner!" Riko exclaimed and ran to her room in a flash. She really didn't want to deal with Rina right now. She had been through enough craziness today.

"Moonbeam! Sunbeam! I got some food for you," Riko called out as she placed the plate on the floor, right next to the side of the bed where Moonbeam and Sunbeam were hiding. As soon as the aroma of the rice pilaf and the Salisbury steak caressed their nostrils, they popped right out and chomped on the leftovers. Riko couldn't help but smile as she watched the hungry little fairy creatures scarf down the food like they had been starved for months. She couldn't help but find them cute, even if they were covered in sloppily put on bandages and band-aids.

"Yay! I absolutely love meat! Especially with the sauce that it comes with! Man, that sure hit the spot! Thanks a lot, Riko-chan!" Sunbeam exclaimed before burping really loud, which made Riko and Moonbeam both burst right into a fit of happy laughter.

"That was a good one, Sunbeam!" Riko exclaimed through her laughter.

"But it's still bad manners though," Moonbeam said through her own laughter. She couldn't believe the Riko laughing with her now was the same one who was bawling her eyes out minutes ago.

Riko regained her composure and told her, "It's okay if she does it here at home. We don't mind at all. Sometimes, Rina and Hikage have burping contests. It's so funny, though I usually end up winning for some reason. So how is it?"

"It's great, Riko-chan. Thank you very much for your generosity. We truly appreciate it," Moonbeam told her kindly and politely once she finished her food. With a graceful, ladylike bow, she expressed her gratitude properly. "We're very sorry all of this craziness happened. I'm sure you must have been frightened by everything that was going on. We don't blame you."

"I'm sorry for messing everything up like I usually do," Riko said. "By the way...what HAS been happening lately? Who's this Zenjin guy? How does he have super powers when he's supposed to be human? And who and what are you guys supposed to be anyway? Oh! I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Tasogare Riko."

"We should probably explain everything from scratch. My name is Moonbeam, and this is my older sister, Sunbeam," Moonbeam told her with a bow.

"You two are sisters?" Riko asked, confused. _'How can they be sisters when they look absolutely nothing alike?'_ Riko thought to herself.

"Yep! We actually have two more sisters. Starbeam and Lovebeam. But we got separated trying to keep Zenjin from coming to earth. That's kinda why we got hurt so bad," Sunbeam explained with a smile, pointing to the bandages.

"You see, we're fairies from the planet called Rozaniela. Well, to be honest, we're actually aliens. We have the power to shape shift, though most of us don't, us included. Don't worry, we're not taking over your planet or have any intention of sucking out your brains. Rozaniela is where we came from. It's a beautiful planet with lots of pretty flowers, castles, quaint towns, and lots and lots of animals and greenery! Our ancestors created it long ago, when they needed to create a safe haven for those who were miserable and suffering. We did try to settle into your planet before without causing a big scene, but the planet didn't suit our tastes, so our ancestors created Rozaniela themselves so we could live in peace, without bothering anybody," Moonbeam explained.

"But aliens aren't the only species to inhabit Rozaniela. Lately we've been taking in abandoned humans because the earth hasn't been kind to them," Sunbeam piped in.

A thought popped into Riko's head right then and there. "Did you guys also take any...babies by any chance?"

"Yep. Lots of them. But only the ones from those run down, dirty orphanages that couldn't care less about their welfare. That's why our friends chose to take them all to Rozaniela, so they can be cared for properly and in a loving, nurturing environment, one that those orphanages didn't give them," Sunbeam replied.

"Isn't that like kidnapping?" Riko asked, remembering the story she heard on the news.

"That's why we only took them from the places that don't care about them. They don't care if they go missing, and they generally go unnoticed, too. That's the only rule: only take them to Rozaniela when absolutely necessary, and from places where it's evident that they are not wanted there, so nobody will care whether they've disappeared or not. We know how bad it can be if we took someone away when it's likely they'll be noticed. That's why we keep a low profile and only go for the ones most likely to be unnoticed and in the most dire need of our help. Sometimes, for really bad cases that absolutely cannot be ignored, they erase the abusers' memories so they won't make a big scene," Moonbeam said.

"Zenjin was one of those kids. He's had a really bad life, and our queen discovered him and decided to take him in as one of her own," Sunbeam piped in.

"Wait, he's _human_?! Then why does he have super powers?!" Riko yelped, bewildered by this new revelation.

"We're getting to that. Yes, Zenjin is human. But even though everyone on Rozaniela did their best to shower him with everything he was deprived of, nothing seemed to work. He always seemed distant and detached from everyone...but then he got his hands on our power source, the Energia," Sunbeam told her. She began to grow sad once she got to that last sentence.

Riko tilted her head downward a little, flummoxed. "Energia?"

"The Energia is a special jewel that contains all the powers our ancestors had. When they were alive, their powers were limitless. They could do whatever they wanted, from warping reality to creating entire planets, even new dimensions. But they knew that this power was dangerous if it was in the wrong hands, so they made the Energia as a container for it to be sealed in. But they did have to seal it in the deepest part of the planet so nobody can access it, because if someone greedy and malicious comes into contact with it, the jewel will turn black, and its powers can be used in all the wrongest ways possible," Moonbeam explained, she herself becoming sad. Her long ears drooped downward sadly. "Zenjin broke through all the secret doors and security systems we set up...and took it away. Once he got his hands on it, he used it to destroy Rozaniela…"

"That's terrible," Riko muttered sadly, feeling quite bad for the little animals.

"I know! So many of our dearest friends and inhabitants died because of him! And he killed them all just so he could see what the Energia was capable of! Then he absorbed it and came here! It's so stupid, right?!" Sunbeam shouted angrily.

"Shhh! Use your indoor voice, Sunbeam," Moonbeam shushed, which made Sunbeam cross her arms and slump onto the floor, pouting. She turned back to Riko and told her more of the story. "If someone absorbs the Energia, they have every power our ancestors had. That's why we tried to keep Zenjin from coming here, but because he's so powerful now, we were unable to stop him. We're sorry he came here."

"It's okay. It's not like you wanted him to come here. I understand," Riko told them kindly. "By the way, do you know what Soul Portals are?"

"I do! Soul Portals are mirror-like objects that are the gateway to a person's heart and soul. It lets you see everything: their dreams, their secrets, their insecurities, their most private thoughts, their likes and dislikes, and everything that defines them from the inside and out," Sunbeam piped in cheerfully.

"So...if one were to look inside one of those things...would that be considered invasion of privacy?"

"Oh yes!" Moonbeam nodded vigorously to further emphasize her response.

'_Reminds me of those dream mirrors from Sailor Moon SuperS,'_ Riko thought. "Do you know how Zenjin's able to turn people's souls into monsters?"

"That part, we don't know," Moonbeam replied. "That's the first time we've ever seen something like that."

"We don't even know why he even came to earth in the first place," Sunbeam piped in.

"I see. Thanks for the info. I'll probably mess everything up, but I'd be more than happy to help you in any way I can," Riko told them. "You two should get some rest if you wanna get better."

"Good point. We promise to be quiet. 'Kay?" Moonbeam said.

"But I do have to say…" Riko said with a smile as she picked them both up and then suddenly hugged them. "You're sooooooo CUTE! I've always dreamed of having cute, fluffy little animal fairy friends, and now I have some! Meow! You're so cuddly and soft and warm and fluffy!" Riko squealed happily, rubbing her cheeks against the fluffy little animal fairies, relishing in their fur, soft as the fur on a newborn kitten.

"You're...crushing...me…" Sunbeam croaked as she was being squeezed by Riko, exacerbating her injuries.

"Ack! Sorry! I'm an idiot!" Riko shouted as she let them go, realizing her wrongdoing. But she certainly wished she could dote on them some more. They were so cute and huggable!

After that, the rest of the day went by just fine. Hotaru went back home while Riko was talking with the fairies. Not only that, Riko decided to spend the rest of the evening playing with the fairies. She found them to be quite good company. She played with them, she read stories to them, she showed them her drawings and made-up stories, she made a little bed for them to sleep in, gave them some dessert to munch on, read manga with them, watched anime with them, everything, and from the happy expressions they had, she could see that they were clearly enjoying being with her. Riko couldn't believe this was happening. She always did dream of having cute little fluffy animal friends, but those were only in the realm of fantasy. She thought she could never have something like that other than stuffed animals, let alone actual humans for friends. But not only has she potentially made one friend, but three friends! For Riko, this was a dream come true.

At about 8:00 PM, Riko went to take a bath. She got pretty dirty during the fight with Marina's corrupted soul, so she really needed one. She was surprised Rina didn't mock her for how dirty she was. After that, she put on some fresh pink pajamas, played with Moonbeam and Sunbeam some more, then went back into the bathroom to blow dry her hair with the hair dryer. After that, she, Moonbeam, and Sunbeam went to bed to sleep the night away, losing herself to her lovely dreamland.

But reality had to be faced the next morning, even though she really didn't want to face it right now. Riko woke up, ate breakfast, got her lunch ready, and put some clothes on. Today's outfit consisted of a long sleeved, soft, pale pink cardigan over a white ruffled shirt, dark blue jean pants, and white ankle socks with light green stars all over them.

"Are you going to school?" Moonbeam asked.

"Yeah. I really don't want to though. I wish I could stay here with you. But when I'm gone, you HAVE to be quiet and act like stuffed animals or else everyone here might find out what you really are," Riko told them with a smile.

"Not to worry! We'll be super duper quiet! Not only that, we were kinda planning on going out and looking for our other sisters, so we won't be here anyway," Sunbeam piped in cheerfully.

"But you're injured. Shouldn't you rest?" Riko asked curiously, concerned for their safety, as she opened her bedroom window for the fairies to fly out of.

"They don't hurt as bad as before. Plus if we keep a low profile and not move around so much, the other humans won't notice us, so we'll be fine. You run along to school, Riko-chan," Moonbeam told her with a sweet smile. Riko couldn't help but find her absolutely adorable.

"Okay. Bye girls!" Riko said as she grabbed a manga and dashed out of her bedroom, leaving Moonbeam and Sunbeam alone inside.

"Have a nice day!" Moonbeam said, waving to Riko as she left.

"Now that she's gone, let's go and look for Starbeam and Lovebeam. They must be scared and frightened by now! I hope they're not hurt," Sunbeam proclaimed as she flew out of the open window, with Moonbeam following her from behind.

"Me too. But Starbeam's smart and sensible. She can take care of herself, even when the situation seems hopeless. It's Lovebeam I'm the most worried about," Moonbeam said.

"That part I totally get. Now let's get moving!" Sunbeam said as she and Moonbeam flew away from the Tasogare house and into parts unknown to search for their missing sisters.

Riko made it to school without a hitch thanks to Saki. She looked around the black top so she could find that red haired, glasses wearing, wheelchair boy from before. Kyoya, was it? There was just so many kids running around playing and shouting, it was hard to make anything out. But as it turned out, she didn't have to look for him.

"Hi, Riko!"

Riko instantly turned around to find him just a little ways away, happily waving at her, with one of his arms proudly rising into the sky, and his green eyes wide and bright, wearing a white shirt with crimson red stripes running across it horizontally, beige khaki pants, and black and white sneakers.

"Hi, Kyoya!" Riko cried out happily as she ran over to him.

"I figured you'd be looking for me," Kyoya said with his usual smile. "By the way, got any more Hinata Sun Child volumes yet? I hear its supposed to end soon!" Kyoya told him, his cheerful radiance proving to be quite persistent.

"I only have up to volume 7 so far. I haven't gotten volume 8 yet, and volume 9 comes out next month. Oh! But I did bring another manga with me. I don't think you've heard of it though," Riko said as she rummaged through her backpack and pulled out another manga to show to him. The issue was volume 4.

"_Pokemon Special_(1)? Awesome! That's one of the older ones, right? I only have some of the Diamond and Pearl series," Kyoya exclaimed excitedly.

"Yep! I just started reading from the beginning, so I only have up to volume 6," Riko said. "But it's really really cool! It's a lot darker and cooler than the Pokemon anime, though I still love the anime."

"Are you gonna get the X and Y games when they come out? I sure am!" Kyoya said.

"I'd love to, but I don't have a 3DS. I'm begging my parents to get me one for Christmas this year. I really want a purple one," Riko said a little bit dejectedly, though not enough to completely deter her.

What they didn't know was that someone was approaching them...and it wasn't someone they thought they'd be happy to see.

"Hey."

Riko and Kyoya turned around to find Marina looking at them. She's wearing an olive green hoodie with a big pocket on the abdomen, grey jean pants, and white sneakers. Their smiles faded as soon as they acknowledged that she appeared. Unlike before, Riko just became a little flummoxed, showing no fear. Just confusion. But in her heart, she was happy Marina was back to normal.

Kyoya, however, donned a face that had a slight hint of contempt. Then again, Marina did knock him off his wheelchair and knock his glasses off his face. But unlike yesterday, Marina didn't look angry or like she wanted to hurt them. She just had an apologetic look on her face. Riko looked away from her like she does everybody, so she couldn't tell.

"What do you want?" Kyoya asked in a low voice, but Riko could hear some twinges of caution peppering it.

At first, Marina said nothing, but after a short while, she gathered the mettle to speak. "Look. I...I'm sorry for what I did to the both of you," She turned to Kyoya. "And...sorry for all the mean stuff I said to you...yesterday and all those other times."

Kyoya wasn't convinced. "Oh. NOW you apologize? For everything you put me and everyone else through all these years? What are you trying to pull?! If this is some kind of trick, we're not gonna fall for it!" He shouted angrily, not intent on accepting her apology.

Marina kept her head down, staring at her feet. Riko could tell she seemed quite hurt by Kyoya's comment. "I figured you'd say that. Oh well. I just wanted to tell you I'm sorry and...I won't do it again," She muttered shyly. With that, she ran away, leaving behind two confused kids.

"What was that all about?" Kyoya asked, confused by this unexpected encounter.

"She's not all bad," Riko muttered out of the blue. Kyoya was about to ask why she'd say something like that until she interrupted him. "My dad and I ran into her yesterday. We found out she's mean to people because they're mean to her. They think that because her dad's a criminal, she's gonna become just like him. She's tried to prove them wrong but nothing worked, so she gave up and decided to be a bully. She said it's what they expect of her."

"That's dumb," Kyoya piped in a little more sympathetically. "I mean, I've heard about her dad, but I only hate her because she picks on me and everyone else a lot. Oh! By the way, did you hear about what happened yesterday? Apparently some monster wreaked havoc last night! I know it sounds hard to believe, but it was on the news this morning!"

"I heard about that," Riko said calmly. But inside, her mind was screaming. _'What?! They know about Asagi's monster form? Or maybe Zenjin, too?! Oh God! If they find out I'm Cure Twilight, they'll all hate me and say I'm the reason bad stuff is happening! What am I gonna dooooo?!'_ Riko screamed in her head. She was about to do some more in-brain screaming until something made her stop thinking about it.

A sound. A sound she knew. She could hear it even through her ears were being flooded by the vociferous sounds of the other kids shouting and playing. She looked around for the source of it while not leaving Kyoya's side. Kyoya could see her fidgeting a little.

"What's up, Riko?" Kyoya asked again.

"Do you hear that?" Riko asked back.

"Hear what?"

"A harmonica."

"Harmonica?"

At first, Kyoya was flummoxed until he figured it out. "Oh! You must be hearing Chino-san playing."

"Chino?"

"Chino Anzu. She's the blonde girl who dresses like a goth. She's in our homeroom and some of our classes. She's really good at the harmonica, and we never see her without one," Kyoya explained with his smile coming back.

"Ohhh! Is that her name?" Riko said.

"Yeah. I've been meaning to befriend her since last year, but I never got around to doing so, mostly because she was never in any of my classes, and she tends to keep to herself, kinda like you. The other kids kinda don't like her though. They think she's a goth because she wears black all the time, though she acts nothing like one," Kyoya explained.

"That's dumb. Just like hating Asagi just because her dad's a criminal."

"That's what I say."

They wanted to talk more, but the bell rang, so they had to go inside the school building. But Riko was able to pick the blonde, bespectacled, black clothes wearing girl, Chino Anzu, out in homeroom immediately. Her hair was a pale, radiant shade of yellow, shining brightly like the morning sunshine. It was extremely long, tied into a long, vibrant ponytail with a pale pink scrunchie. She has fair skin, light green eyes like limes hidden behind those big, coke-bottle glasses of hers, and her wardrobe didn't look like anything a typical goth would wear. She wasn't wearing any makeup, like eyeliner or lipstick or anything of the sort, and she didn't have any piercings either. All she was wearing was a black and red Sweeney Todd themed hoodie that's unzipped, a navy blue shirt under it with Wonder Woman on it, black jeans with some silver hoops on them where one can strap things on them (she heard they were called bondage pants, but she doesn't like the way it sounds), and white and purple sneakers. It'd be one thing if she was wearing them way down to the point where her undies would show like other kids she knew did before she moved, but the girl didn't look nor act like those kids she knew back then, and her pants seemed to be at the appropriate height.

It was easy to see why other kids didn't approach her. She certainly didn't look very approachable, but then again, Riko hardly ever approached anyone for other reasons. But Riko didn't think she looked mean, though she could be wrong. A shiny, sterling silver harmonica dangled from a purple string around Anzu's neck. It looked very worn out, like it had been used a lot, but that didn't make it lose its shine. That must have been the one she played earlier, before the bell rang. She wanted to talk to her, but she was afraid she might scare her or anger her, as she usually did other people, so she decided not to. For the most part, the morning went by just fine, even though some weird boy made a scene in gym class, causing the teacher to get angry and send him to the principal's office.

At lunch time, things became a lot nicer. "Hey, Riko! Wanna sit with me?" Kyoya asked cheerfully, inviting her to sit at his lunch table.

Without any hesitation at all, Riko said yes and spent the lunch hour with him. Within minutes, Riko could feel that eating lunch with someone and having fun conversations with them proved to be far, FAR better than sitting all alone, and Riko never sat with anyone at lunch her entire life! This was a new experience for her, but one she would soon find to be very warm, comforting, and even enjoyable. She could sit with Kyoya every single day. It was clear he enjoyed her company, and she enjoyed his. Like her, he also brought lunch from home. She couldn't believe this was happening. But it was no dream.

She wondered if that could be true too.

"Kyoya…" Riko muttered shyly.

"Yeah? What?" Kyoya asked as he finished chomping on a red leather fruit strip.

"I know this sounds weird, but...can we be…" Riko felt choked up just trying to get the words out. But in the end, she finally blurted it out. "Can be friends?!"

Kyoya didn't waste any time answering. "Aren't we already friends?"

"Wait...we are?" Riko asked, flummoxed by Kyoya's counter question. It began to dawn on her, but she kept on denying it in her heart.

"Totally! We have so much in common!" Kyoya exclaimed with a radiant grin. "We both like manga and anime, we're kinda misfits around here, and people like Inoue drive us _crazy_! How can we NOT be friends?! Seriously! Besides, I think you're pretty cool, Riko. I don't see why we can't be friends!"

It was so unexpected. She never thought this day would come. It was so shocking, so out of the blue, so out of nowhere, yet it felt so right…

"What the-?! Are you...crying?!"

She felt something warm and wet on her face. She put her hand on it to find the source of it: tears. Embarrassed, she tried to wipe them off with her bare arms. How can she be crying when she should be happy? "Sorry! It's not you! It's just...I...I haven't had friends in a long time."

Kyoya's smile faded. "Define a long time."

"My mom says I had some in kindergarten, but I don't remember them.. Some kids always picked on me, and most adults I met all thought I was a bad kid. Sorry. I really shouldn't be acting like this…" Riko muttered sadly as she helplessly tried to wipe the tears off of her wet face.

Again, he wasted no time talking. "Screw them! They just don't see how nice you are! So what if you're kinda weird? We're all weird here! And you're NOT dumb! You stood up to Asagi when she knocked me over, and you wasted no time telling her off, so I can't see why people think you're bad."

_We're all weird here_. She couldn't help but giggle a little at that, which brought Kyoya's radiant grin back. She should start using that remark when someone calls her weird. They consumed their lunch and talked the rest of the moment away. Then they talked some more at recess. Some kids decided to tease them upon seeing them together, but Kyoya paid absolutely no heed to them, and if he didn't, then she didn't have to pay attention either.

Words just couldn't describe Riko's sheer happiness upon realizing that she's made her first ever friend. She never thought it would happen to her, but it did, and her cup of happiness was literally overflowing with of joy, not intent on getting plugged up by some mean people anytime soon.

But soon, Riko would find another friend.

At science class, she requested to go to the bathroom real quick. She remembered where it was. She passed it lots of times during classes, so she knew where it was, keeping its location in her head. Her memory proved to be right, and she found it exactly where it was before. She went in, did what she needed to do, and proceeded to wash her hands in the sink. She had to admit, she didn't like how sticky the liquid soap from the container felt on her hands. It was warm and felt like muddy puddle water, and she did not like muddy puddle water. But she had to use it or else her hands would have germs on them.

That's when it happened.

The door burst right open. Footsteps stomped hastily through the bathroom, scaring Riko into having a mini heart attack. One of the bathroom door stalls swung open with a bang, and then a loud sound assaulted her ears.

The sound of someone vomiting.

Riko hastily dried her hands with the paper towels and turned around to see what was wrong. When she finished, she crept over to the stall that was open. She didn't even have to go too far to find out who was vomiting.

The huge, blonde ponytail and Sweeney Todd themed hoodie gave it all away.

"Are you okay?!" Riko yelped as she ran over to the blonde girl. The girl stopped puking. She panted like she ran a marathon and pulled the toilet's lever so the horrible stuff can be flushed down the drain, never to be seen or smelled again. Riko was thankful it was gone, but a repulsive odor lingered in the bathroom air, and she didn't like it. But she didn't dare complain. "You okay?" She asked again.

Anzu turned around and her hazel green eyes widened when she saw Riko behind her. But she could tell she looked quite concerned and worried. Sluggishly, Anzu stood up, pulled a napkin out of her pocket, and wiped her mouth with it. "I am now. Sorry you had to see and hear that," She replied in a nice but somewhat husky voice. Riko couldn't tell if that was her normal voice or if it was because she puked just now.

"It's okay. But you should probably go to the nurse. You might end up doing it again and not even know it," Riko suggested with concern twinging her voice. Anzu nodded in agreement, and the two of them left the bathroom.

A small water fountain came into view.

"Oh!" Riko exclaimed as she took Anzu by the wrist and gently dragged her to the fountain. "You should get a drink first. My mom says that when people vomit, they get dehydrated, and that's not good for their system."

"Yeah. Thanks," Anzu croaked as she did as Riko asked and took a good sip of the water from the fountain. Once she finished, they headed off to the nurse's office. Anzu sat down on one of the beds. Riko was about to sit down as well, but her olive green purse slipped off her shoulder and onto the floor, causing her manga to pop right out.

"Agh! This always happens!" Riko said as she scrambled to put her manga back in her purse.

"Hey. Is that the Pokemon manga?" Anzu suddenly asked out of the blue.

"Yeah. Why?"

"I've been meaning to read that for a while. I never got around to it."

A glimmer of hope blazed in Riko's heart. Another friend, maybe? "You read manga?"

"Yep. I like stuff like FMA, Madoka Magica, 07-Ghost-"

"You should get back to class, Tasogare," The female nurse told her.

"Sorry! We'll talk more later. Feel better soon, okay?" Riko told her, a little disappointed that she couldn't stay and talk some more.

"Thanks for helping me. See you in homeroom," Anzu told her with a warm smile and waved as Riko ran out of the nurse's office and back to class.

* * *

Friends can be a wonderful thing to have. At Hikaribashi High School, just before the last bell rang, Hikage and Hotaru sat by themselves, happily chatting like they've known each other for years. "Is it true you take naginata lessons?" Hikage asked with a smile.

"Yep. I've been practicing since I was ten. I really like it," Hotaru replied sweetly, with her own smile. Hikage couldn't help but think she looked like a princess when she smiled like that.

"I'll bet it's hard."

"It is, but it's very fun. Plus it's a way for me to defend myself if a stranger tries to attack me. I never go anywhere without it. Are you in any clubs in particular?"

"Not clubs, per se, but I do kinda wanna join the basketball team."

"Basketball, huh? Nice! Were you on any teams in your last schools?"

"Yep! If you can believe it, I was Enrai Middle School's star player! I even helped my team get to the nationals! But we did get creamed part of the way through, so that stunk."

"You did your best, and that's all that matters. Oh! By the way, have you heard about that incident yesterday?"

"What incident? Do you mean the one about some monster attacking the neighborhood?"

"Yes," She didn't dare tell Hikage that she was there. He might start asking questions that she may be unable to answer. But she figured just telling him about the incident wouldn't hurt. "Nobody was killed, that's good. But I just want you to be careful if anything like that happens again," She advised calmly.

"You be careful too. Don't wanna lose the first friend I made here!"

Hotaru smiled. But she noticed the dirty looks some people were giving her. Some people even began whispering. "Can you believe Tasogare's hanging out with her?"

"She's really stuck-up, isn't she? Always sitting around, reading her books like she's so much smarter than the rest of us."

"Why doesn't she just go to college already?"

Hikage could see Hotaru frown. "Do people talk about you like that all the time?"

Hotaru nodded grimly. "Sort of. Since I was ten."

"Pfft! They don't know anything. I don't think you're stuck-up. If you were, I wouldn't be hanging out with you, and you wouldn't have given my ID back," Hikage told her kindly.

This brought Hotaru's smile back. "True that."

"We should totally hang out more."

"I agree. Maybe I can invite you to my house sometime."

"That'd be awesome!" With that, the bell rang, and everyone went home for the day.

Footnotes:

1\. Pokemon Special is a manga by Hidenori Kusaka and Satoshi Yamamoto. It's a manga adaptation of the games, but is considered its own continuity and deity, different from both the games they're based on and the anime.


	3. Illuminate The Night Sky! Cure Starlight

**Author's Note: Hi everyone. Just so you know, I changed some of this chapter and cut things out to address some issues. Hopefully this version is better!**

* * *

Chapter 3: Illuminate The Night Sky! Cure Starlight Arrives!

"Urgh…" A pale blue creature with small, ball-like ears with pale yellow tips on them found herself laying in the base of a patch of white flowers. Her evergreen eyes peeled open, slowly, as the light was a bit too bright at first. After a while, she rubbed her eyes with her stubby little fingerless paws to adjust them to the light. Once she was fully wide awake, she looked around to survey her surroundings. She was in the middle of a large field of flowers in all the colors of the rainbow, divided into systematic patterns.

But that wasn't what she was worried about. As much as she wanted to admire their beauty, there are more important things to think about.

"Sunbeam? Moonbeam? Lovebeam? Where are you!" She called out at first. No response.

She put both paws on her mouth. _'Calm down, Starbeam. Don't cry out or else you may attract unwanted attention,'_ The creature thought to herself. _'Now let's retrace what happened. Zenjin destroyed Rozaniela, absorbed the Energia, and escaped to Earth. We tried to stop him with the powers we had and...he got free,'_ Starbeam thought again, becoming sad once she got further into her memory of what happened.

She then looked up at the cloudless blue sky. As much as she wanted to admire how beautiful the sky is, her heart was heavy with sadness.

"I have to find my sisters. I hope they're not hurt. Queen Malgorzata is counting on us…" Starbeam muttered to herself. She floated off of the flowers and onto parts unknown. She made sure to not fly in public places and keep a low profile, as she knew very well that this is a world in which creatures like her are an anomaly. She might attract unwanted attention, and that was the last thing she wanted to do. There was too much to deal with already.

"So this is what Earth looks like...it's a lot prettier than I thought it'd be. But I assume there's a lot of unkempt places too. I'm hoping Zenjin isn't planning on destroying everything. What does he plan to do with his newly acquired powers? Obviously something malicious and unacceptable, that much I know for sure," Starbeam said to herself as she flew wherever she thought she could find her sisters. The worry in her little heart amassed like a pile of bricks.

'_Moonbeam...Starbeam...Lovebeam...please be alright. I would cry forever and be heartbroken beyond all reason if you died...or worse! Zenjin might kill you with his new powers. No! I cannot let myself be consumed by a tsunami of worries! I simply must keep my equanimity should I be able to find them. If I am sad, then they will be sad too, and I won't be able to find them if I stay like this. We can't let Queen Malgorzata down. Ohhh, if only I had some kind of tracking device or something of the sort!'_ Starbeam ruminated to herself as she flew further and further into parts unknown. Her worry for her sisters didn't stop amassing, no matter what she did.

* * *

When Riko got back from school yesterday, she asked Moonbeam and Sunbeam if they found their other sisters yet. Sadly, their search came up completely fruitless, and Riko could tell they were extremely worried. But she could see that their injuries were slowly but gradually healing, so that was a good sign. She wished she could help them in their search, but she never went out on her own. The farthest she went was her backyard. Not only that, school was taking up most of her time, and today was yet another day of it.

It didn't even start off on a good note.

"RINAAAA! You spilled apple juice all over my shiiiiirt!" Riko's piercing scream echoed all through the house. It was so loud, everybody heard it. The fairies almost exposed themselves to the entire Tasogare family, but they were extra careful and made sure to hide under the bed and keep their mouths shut.

An angry Riko shoved a pretty white shirt with puffed sleeves and flower shaped buttons with an unsightly yellow apple juice stain all over the bottom part of it in the surprised younger girl's face. But Rina just put on a pouty face and crossed her arms like she was the victim. Arinao, Saki, and Hikage were in the dining room with them, surprised and exasperated by this fiasco.

"No I didn't! You spilled it! It's your own fault for being stupid! You oughta be more careful, weirdo cat!" Rina snapped petulantly.

"I DON'T EVEN LIKE APPLE JUICE! You have the box in your hand for crying out loud!" Riko screamed.

"Riko! Use your inside voice!" Saki scolded, already at her wit's end, but Riko paid no heed. Rina, gasping upon seeing the squished apple juice box in her hand, ran to the trash can and threw it in there.

"No I don't!" Rina whined back, obviously trying to cover it up, but isn't doing a good job of it.

"Come on. It was an accident, and Rina, you know we don't call names in the house, and don't make it sound like Riko is the only one who makes mistakes around here. Now say you're sorry," Hikage told her sternly, with his own arms crossed.

"I don't see why I gotta! It really was an accident! And she left her shirt someplace she shouldn't have! It's why she doesn't have any friends!" Rina snapped back.

"Rina. Apologize. NOW," Hikage repeated again, angrier this time. Rina, who knew better than to cross her older brother, finally relented.

"Sorry…" She muttered.

But Riko wasn't buying it. "Do you know how much Mom paid for this?! And do you even know how bad stains are on white clothes?! You had to go and ruin it forever, just like my favorite Moomin doll! Now I can't wear it anymore! Why can't you actually take responsibility for once?! And for the record, I actually DO have friends!" She yelled.

"Riko! Inside voice!" Saki scolded again.

"You? Have friends?" Rina asked, her eyes wide with bewilderment, looking quite dumbfounded. Then she suddenly burst into a fit of laughter as though she heard the funniest joke ever. "No way! No you don't! You don't have any friends!"

"Rina! That is enough!" Arinao yelled, appalled by his younger daughter's persistent petulance. Riko covered her ears, but she was still lucid enough to continue talking.

Riko's face turned red, but she didn't relent. "That's because you haven't met them! By the way, do YOU have any friends yet?" Riko asked.

"Enough! It's done and over with! Both of you, get ready for school now!" Saki yelled, scaring her two daughters into running to their rooms in fear. Riko, with her apple juice contaminated shirt in hand, ran back to her room. Funnily enough, Moonbeam and Sunbeam were just outside her door when she came in.

"We saw the whole thing," Moonbeam said, scratching one of her ears.

Sunbeam shook her head. "Your sister's a real brat."

"Oh, brat doesn't even BEGIN to describe her!" Riko went on and on about Rina's naughty attitude. Rina leaving her toys around and not bothering to clean them up. Making a big deal out of Riko's occasional mistakes. Playing the victim when she does something she shouldn't. Flaunting her successes in Riko's face every chance she got. Nagging at Riko in regards to her behavior and fashion sense. The list went on.

Once she finished, Sunbeam spoke. "We know exactly how you feel. Lovebeam acts EXACTLY like that, but she whines every single day. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. About EVERYTHING. There's never a day in Rozaniela where she isn't complaining and whining and screeching about any little thing that's bad or wrong in her eyes. And here's the thing: she's the OLDEST out of all of us sisters! She always tells me that everything I cook is bad, even though everyone else says it's the best they've ever had."

Riko found herself flummoxed. "Really? Jeez," Aren't older sisters supposed to be the ones being annoyed by little sisters, not the ones doing the annoying?

Moonbeam put a comforting hand on Riko's shoulder. "It's very tiring. We understand completely how you feel, and I'm the youngest in the family. But you have to admit, Rina IS only seven years old. Perhaps she'll learn her lesson and grow up a little."

"I doubt it. But thanks for listening," Riko grumbled as she put her school books in her bag. At least at school, she can hang out with Kyoya and maybe even Anzu. Hikage can hang out with Hotaru. That's one benefit of school: getting away from annoying little sisters, the huge age gap being a big help.

As soon as she met with Kyoya and Anzu on the blacktop, the boiling anger in her little heart finally died down. They listened to her tale intently, never interrupting her or telling her to shut up, which Riko found to be very unusual but very satisfying at the same time. Usually when she wanted to tell someone about something, they'd either interrupt her, tell her to shut her trap, or just not listen at all, the latter two scenarios being the most common, and Riko hated that. She felt even more relieved to know that someone's finally listening, and that she's ACTUALLY being heard. She couldn't believe her luck. Was fortune finally smiling on her at last?

"It's a good thing I'm an only child," Anzu said.

"Me too. Sorry we can't relate. But your sister seems like a real brat. I'd go crazy if I had to put up with her," Kyoya piped in.

"Believe me, she drives me crazy every single day! Worst of all, she's always saying stuff like, _'Why can't you be normal, like me?'_" Riko mimicked Rina's screechy voice in a funny way that actually made Anzu chuckle a bit. "She doesn't even believe I have any friends! But then again, I don't really blame her, since was too young to remember the friends I did make in kindergarten."

"Maybe she secretly doesn't have any friends at her own school. Maybe she's jealous," Anzu piped in with a smile.

"I dunno. She had lots and lots of friends before we moved. She was practically the queen of the school," Riko countered.

"Does she really call you names and say how you're not normal compared to her every single day?" Kyoya asked, a little more seriously this time.

"Yeah. Every day. She doesn't stop even when Mom and Dad yell at her," Riko said.

A grim look took over Kyoya's face. "She really doesn't realize how insensitive she's being, is she? Insults like that can really hurt a person, especially if they do it every day. If I ever meet Rina some day, I'm gonna really lay it down with her. Look at me! My only problem is that can't walk, yet people just assume my brain is broken too!"

"People think that? That's so dumb!" Anzu asked, surprised by what Kyoya just said. Even Riko was flummoxed by this new realization. Why would anyone just outright assume someone's brain damaged if it's only their legs that don't work? She had seen people in wheelchairs that looked and acted like they've had significant brain damage, but Kyoya isn't one of them.

"I know, right?" Kyoya exclaimed.

"Rina's wrong about you. We think you're cool. Who cares what she or anyone else thinks?" Anzu said, putting a hand on Riko's shoulder. "You're you, and that's okay with us."

Riko smiled. She had been right to befriend Anzu. She had been quite warm, kind, and understanding since their first encounter. Not only that, Riko had always noticed that Anzu had a cool air about her. Riko heard people say some bad things about Anzu, but she never noticed any of it. She assumed that she was either deliberately ignoring them or that they were flying right over her head. Riko wished she could ignore mean comments easily like Anzu could.

But after that, the school day went fine again. Nothing special. Lessons were just beginning to start, and everything seemed easy so far. However, at recess, Riko had to go to the bathroom. Once she finished, she walked right back out into the hall.

"Ugh. I really shouldn't be going so often. I won't have time to play with Anzu and Kyoya…" Riko muttered to herself, not really paying attention to her surroundings. Then she felt something hard beneath her shoe, and she could feel herself slipping.

"Whoa! OWW!" Riko yelled as she fell on her rear end rather painfully. "That hurt!" Riko whined. But once she calmed down, she found the item that she slipped on, just a couple feet away from her.

It was a rather crude looking book that looked like a big diary, complete with soft, pink covering and a lock that clipped on. On its cover were a bunch of letters hastily pasted on it like they were cut out of magazines, making it look like a really bad art project. The pasted on letters read, _The Burn Book._ There were also some fake flowers glued on there, with some of the glue showing around the edges. Riko very slowly and carefully picked it up, making sure she didn't accidentally pull off the decorations, not that she really cared either way.

"Burn book?" Riko asked as she rotated it and turned it around to see if anything more was on it. She undid the little lock and opened it. The first thing she saw was on the back of the front cover, and what she saw were the words, _'Authored by Inoue Yoshie, Co-Authored by Amami Shizuka and Shiina Toshiko,'_ She didn't recognize any of the names, but she did remember hearing Kyoya say something about someone named Inoue driving him crazy. Is this Inoue Yoshie person who he was referring to?

Her suspicions were confirmed the minute she skimmed through the so-called burn book.

The pages of the book are literally covered from corner to corner with pictures of kids and teachers from the school and lots and lots of scribbles around them in multicolored marker. All of the scribbles were insults, secrets, rumors, and extremely derogatory gossip. Mostly about other classmates.

She, Kyoya, Marina, and Anzu being four of them.

It went on and on, and it was full with stuff she didn't dare repeat. Riko couldn't believe what she was reading. She figured someone said bad things about her behind her back, so she wasn't surprised about that. There was always one, she learned.

But it was what this person wrote about Anzu, Kyoya, and her other classmates that appalled her to the point of no return. She couldn't repeat these things. Whoever this person was, Riko was NOT going to let her get away with slandering her friends and making up untrue lies about them! She shoved the tacky pink book under her arm and stomped into the principal's office, managing to find one of the secretaries.

"Excuse me! Is the principal here by any chance?" Riko asked out of the blue, surprising the female secretary.

"Oh! You scared me! Shouldn't you be outside playing?" The lady exclaimed, shocked by Riko's unprecedented entrance.

"Is the principal here?" Riko asked again.

"Yes. Do you have an appointment with him?" She asked.

"No. I need to show him this," Riko said as she handed her the tacky pink book. The secretary flipped through it. Her eyes widened with every page she turned. "He HAS to know about it! They're saying mean things about my friends!"

"Thanks for showing me this. I'll show this to Shindoh-sensei immediately. Go back outside now," The secretary told her kindly. With that, Riko ran right back outside. She wanted to tell Anzu and Kyoya about what she saw, but the bell rang so they had to go back in. But the PA system came on as soon as science class started.

"_Amane-sensei?"_

"Yes?"

"_Can you please send Inoue Yoshie, Amami Shizuka, and Shiina Toshiko to my office please?"_

"Sure. They're on their way."

"_Thank you."_

"Off you go, girls!" Mr. Amane literally shooed the girls out as soon as the principal asked for their presence in his office. Some kids went "Oooooh!" like they knew they were in some kind of trouble. Reluctantly, the trio of girls left the science room. Riko couldn't help but smile. She hoped they'd receive some well deserved punishment for the horrible things they wrote in that book. She felt happy that she was able to do a good deed. She felt so good, she smiled the rest of the day, even after Saki came and picked her and Rina up. But Saki did tell her and Rina that Hikage was coming home a little late today.

* * *

Nine year old Tanaka Hanae wished she could walk home from school by herself, instead of having her mothers come pick her up by car.

She begged her parents to let her walk home from school since she was seven years old. All of her other classmates did it, and she didn't see why she couldn't.

But more than that, she couldn't bear the thought of her classmates finding out.

She begged and begged, but her mothers wouldn't relent. "The answer's still no, Hanae. You're too young to be going out on your own."

Whenever school would let out, Hanae dove into her mother's car quicker than a cheetah before anyone could see her. Whether it was Hisako or Miki, or both of them, she'd jump into the car and demand that they drive away as fast as they could. Her two mothers were always confused as to why she was so adamant to go home.

Later that day, after Hanae went to watch another episode of Pretty Cure, her mother Miki dropped in on her. "Hana-chan. We're going out to dinner tonight. All three of us."

Hanae dropped the remote and did a double take. "What?!"

"Isn't that great?" Miki asked with a smile.

"Why?! Can't we have dinner here like usual?!" Hanae yelped. Miki found herself confused. She thought Hanae would be happy, but instead Hanae is acting like the apocalypse happened.

"There's nothing wrong with a chance of pace once in a while, and it gets boring sitting around in the house so much," Miki told her kindly. "We're going to The Lion's Den. They have great spaghetti."

"Can't I stay home while you and Hisako go? I can stay home by myself!" Hanae exclaimed.

Miki donned a solemn look. "No, Hanae. You're too young to stay here all by yourself. We're going out to dinner and that's final. They have a great dessert selection, and I know how much you like strawberry shortcake."

Hanae's face burned. She didn't even bother to watch the newest Pretty Cure episode. She just ran to her room and buried herself in her homework. _'If someone sees me with them, they'll pick on me forever!'_ Hanae thought. As much as she'd like to concentrate on her homework, she just couldn't do it.

The sounds of kids laughing maliciously consumed her mind, and Hanae tried to push them out to no avail. She couldn't go out with both Hisako and Miki. If it was one of her parents it'd be fine, but if her classmates saw her with both of them, she'd never hear the end of it.

She wished she could stay home and watch Pretty Cure.

* * *

"Hyah!" In a dojo, Minamigawa Hotaru, dressed in a white shirt and navy blue pants, along with midnight blue plastic kendo bogu, wielding a pale brown, wooden naginata replica in her arms, fiercely knocked another person's weapon away, pointing her own right at his neck.

"Gawww. You win again, Minamigawa…" The boy she fought against complained as he took off his bogu helmet.

"You should never get cocky during a battle. You shouldn't only use a naginata for just attacks. It can work as defense too," Hotaru said as she pulled off her armor.

"Good job today, kids! You all did a great job! Practice is over!" A female coach exclaimed, clapping her hands. As soon as she said that, the high schoolers, both male and female, scrambled to the locker rooms, got dressed in their normal clothes, packed up their stuff, and left, happy to finally be free.

Hotaru was the last to get out, as she dressed herself back in her black skinny jeans, a purple and pinkish purple smock with a big red ribbon on the front and medium length sleeves, brown laced boots, and her silver hooped earrings. She grabbed her large naginata bag and flung it over her shoulder before she left. But she stopped when she saw someone standing outside the dojo.

"Hikage?!" Hotaru yelped.

"In the flesh!" Hikage retorted with a smile, wearing his round glasses, a crimson red T-shirt underneath an unzipped pale brown sweater jacket, black jeans, and orange and white sneakers, with his black and lightning blue book bag slung over his shoulder.

"How'd you find out where I practice?" Hotaru asked.

"I looked it up. This is the only naginata dojo in all of Hikaribashi," He replied.

"Why'd you come?"

"To watch, of course! Is that bad?"

"No," She replied with a smile. "But how long have you been there?"

"Only half an hour. Why? You...don't want me to come watch your practice?"

"Oh, no no no! Not at all! I'm happy you came! I just never expected it, that's all!" Hotaru exclaimed waving her free hand around, thinking she might have given him the wrong idea. Good thing Hikage understood. She took a breath and calmed down a bit. "No one's ever come to watch me practice."

"Guess that means I'm the first!"

Hotaru let out a small giggle. "You sure are."

"But that's not the only reason I'm here," Hikage said. Hotaru could see quite an unusual sparkle in his eyes, like he was happier than he usually was. She wondered if it was because they just met, or maybe it was normal and she didn't know. "See, I was wondering if maybe...if it's okay with you, if we could have dinner together again. But just the two of us this time. There's a neat little restaurant right around here that my family and I went to once, and the food is not only cheap but super good!"

Hotaru couldn't believe her ears. Hikage was asking to go out with her? In THAT way? He's inviting her to dinner, to a restaurant, and he specifically said the two of them. Hotaru donned a suspicious smile.

She just couldn't resist asking this. "Why, Tasogare Hikage...are you by chance asking me out on a date?" Hotaru asked in a playfully teasing way, with a mischievous smile and glint in her eyes, bending downward and peering into his face like an overly jealous girlfriend.

Hikage suddenly had to take a step back. "A date?! No! Not at all! I'm not ready for that kinda stuff yet!" Hikage stammered, waving his hands around, just like Hotaru did just seconds ago. Hotaru stood up straight and removed herself from his personal space, allowing the shy young man to play it cool this time. "Really, that's not what I mean. It's just...you're really cool, and I don't believe what those guys are saying about you and your parents are true. Plus we don't have any homework to do, and I thought it'd be nice to get to know each other better. Or do you have any other plans? If it's a bad idea, then that's totally fine."

Hotaru couldn't help but blush just a little bit. _'He's so nice. He really is a friend after all,'_ Hotaru thought with a sweet smile on her face. _'I guess it wouldn't hurt to accept his offer. But I wonder if he'll even be able to pay for the food? I don't want to rob him of his money. But it'd be inconsiderate to reject his kindness. Urgh! I might as well go with it! It's not like I have anything else planned, and he's right. This'll be a great chance to get to know him better. He doesn't automatically hate me like everyone else does,'_ Hotaru thought.

"Sure! I'd love to go with you!" Hotaru said, her smile bright and radiant, which made Hikage beam with joy.

"Yes! Ha ha!" Hikage jumped in the air once and cheered, pumping two of his fists into the air. "Dinner's on me, so I'm paying!"

"Do you have enough? I don't want to rob you of your money," Hotaru said a little bit meekly.

"No no! It's totally fine! I have a ton of it with me! Besides, like I said, this place has really cheap food. Come on! It's right around the corner so we can walk!" Hikage said as he took Hotaru by the hand and dragged her away from the naginata dojo, complete with her gear.

"But...do you have a ride home? Do your parents know?" Hotaru asked.

"Yep! I told them! Dad's picking me up! You should probably tell your folks, too!" Hikage told her.

"Sure. I will as soon as we get there," Hotaru said as she allowed herself to be dragged by her newly acquired friend. Her heart was already beginning to race with anticipation, bewilderment, and sheer joy.

The restaurant they went to wasn't anything fancy. It was merely just a nice little food place. It was called The Lion's Den. When Hikage and Hotaru arrived, she stopped to give her parents a call, letting them know what she was doing, and she said she'll call when she needed to be picked up. The inside of the restaurant was very nice. All the walls were painted crimson red, giving it a very regal look. There were round tables with beige, cushion seats, normal tables with chairs, and little tables on the outer deck, overlooking the main street. There were some small, bronze lion statues sitting out in front of the store. Not fancy, but they definitely gave off the impression of the place really being a lion's den. Soft, muted jazz music played in the background.

The small, cylindrical lights that hung from the ceiling shone in a muted gold color, not too bright and not too dim, easy on the eyes. Little TVs hung from other parts of the restaurant, playing either the news channel or sports games. Hotaru and Hikage didn't really want to watch any TV. They just wanted to enjoy their dinner. Hotaru ordered some spaghetti and meatballs while Hikage ordered a personal favorite of his: cheese ravioli. As they ate their food, they told each other some funny jokes.

"So, the officer says, _'Your eyes are bloodshot. Have you been drinking?'_ and the guy says to the police officer, _'Why, yer eyes look glazed. Have ya been eatin' donuts?'_" Hikage said while laughing, which made Hotaru burst into very hearty and joyful laughter as well. Once they calmed down, they took some more bites of their food.

"You sure have a great sense of humor," Hotaru told him, her smile radiant like a newly blooming sunflower, her eyes shining like stars in a night sky.

"You think so? It's not THAT great," Hikage said ruefully, rubbing his head of hair with his left hand, his face turning a little red like the meat sauce on Hotaru's spaghetti. "Oh! That reminds me! Where do you live?"

"I actually live right near Hikaribashi Middle School," Hotaru told him, unknowingly glancing at a young girl with orange braids sitting with two older women some tables down from where she is. The girl with the orange braids ducked as soon as Hotaru glanced at her, leaving her confused.

"Hey! Riko goes there!" Hikage exclaimed happily.

"Here's my address," Hotaru said as she pulled out a pencil and a piece of paper, wrote on it, and gave it to Hikage. He opened it and found that it read, in very beautiful Kanji, _974 Kamiyama Boulevard_.

"Oh! I know where that is! That's the route Mom takes when she takes Riko to school!" Hikage exclaimed.

Soon, Hotaru's smile faded just a little bit, and her eyes adopted a slightly concerned glint. "Speaking of which, umm...sorry if this sounds like I'm meddling, but...your younger sister...Riko, right? Umm...I noticed that when I came over, she seemed afraid of me."

"Riko? Afraid of you?" Hikage asked, a little flummoxed by the sudden change in subject.

"It looked that way. She seemed nervous, like I frightened her. Did I do something bad?" Hotaru asked tenderly.

"No no no. It's not you at all. Riko's just really shy around new people," Hikage told her reassuringly. "Plus...I have a question for you. Do you know what Autism is?"

"Autism? Oh! Isn't that a neurological disorder? I hear it impairs communication and socialization," Hotaru replied.

"Sorta. It means someone's brain is wired differently than normal, which kinda alters the way they perceive the world and heightens their senses quite a bit. Riko's autistic. She's not too good with socializing with people, especially with kids her own age. Plus, she sticks out like a sore thumb in general, but she's not a bad person," Hikage explained in a lucid, casual way, hoping she understood the gist of it.

"I see," Hotaru said.

"She's real nice. She's the sweetest kid I know. She's nice, kind, gentle, loves animals, and is way cooler than any other girl I've met. But…"

"But what?" Hotaru noticed that Hikage donned a slightly sad look.

"...She hasn't had the best of experiences back at our old town. Technically, she's high functioning, and is very capable of learning. But she has a bit of a tendency to be kinda tactless and sometimes say and do inappropriate things that most people find unacceptable in public, like pretend play acting or saying something she doesn't understand is bad. She often has a hard time coming up with the right words to say stuff, and that made a lot of people think she was being rude or malicious or mean, which she wasn't," Hikage told her. "Plus, she's very shy and guarded, mostly because in second grade, the school she went to wasn't exactly kind to her. The teacher was really mean and picked on her every chance she got. When she told Mom and Dad about it, they filed a suit against the school and tried to get the teacher fired. It didn't work out."

"Did she go to other schools?" Hotaru asked, appalled by what she just heard.

"Yeah. Mom and Dad found a better school for her. She did have nice teachers at the last school she went to before we moved, but kids were still mean to her," Hikage replied.

"I see," Hotaru mused. "Well, I don't know if this'll help, but Hikaribashi has a lot of nice people in it. Kids I met hardly ever made an issue about my parents, so I don't think Riko has anything to worry about."

Hikage smiled again after hearing that. "I think Riko'd be glad to hear that. But she's been so traumatized that she doubts pretty much everybody, even potentially good people. I don't blame her. But...I think she'd really like you."

"Hanae. Get out from under there," A frizzy haired woman said. Hikage and Hotaru turned to look at another table. A girl with orange braids hid underneath a round table. "Come on out. There's nothing to be afraid of."

Hanae creeped out from under the table with a pouty look on her face. "Why do you keep hiding? It's not appropriate, dear," A woman with caramell colored hair said.

"But if people find out I have two moms, they're gonna laugh at me and pick on me forever," Hanae told them worriedly.

"There's nothing to worry about, Hanae. Nobody's going to pick on you. Times have changed," Miki told her reassuringly.

"You don't know that!" Hanae protested.

"Eat your spaghetti, dear," Hisako told her kindly. The family went back to their dinner.

Soon, everyone finished their dinner, paid their checks, and left, including Hanae and her mothers. Hikage walked home, and Hotaru called her parents so they could pick her up, which they did.

* * *

Later, in the town where Riko's school is, a silver BMW pulled into the driveway of a dark brown house. Out from the BMW came Hanae and her two mothers. "Wow! That was great! I wanna go again!" Miki exclaimed.

Hanae found herself smiling. "Yeah. Can we go again sometime?"

"Sure, sweetie!" Hisako told her, ruffling her hair gently. Hanae was about to go inside until a voice made her freeze in her tracks.

"Hanae-chan! Hey!" A girl with dark brown pigtails called out to her before approaching her. Hanae's smile faded, being replaced with shock and horror. "I didn't know you lived here! That's so great!"

"Who's this, Hana-chan?" Miki asked.

"Are you Hana-chan's moms?" The girl asked. "I'm Yuiko! Hanae is my bestest friend!"

"That's great! It's so nice to meet you, Yuiko-chan!" Hisako kneeled down to shake Yuiko's hand. Hanae's face burned red with shame.

"I live across the street in that yellow house! Hey, Hanae-chan! Do you wanna come over so we can watch Pretty Cure together? My big sister-"

"They're NOT my moms!" Hanae roared, making Yuiko recoil. After that, Hanae sprinted away.

"Hana-chan! Come back!" Miki ran after her, but Hanae managed to outrun her.

* * *

"Any luck finding them?" Riko asked when Sunbeam and Moonbeam came into her room as she was drawing more characters.

They both shook their heads grimly. "No. Still no luck," Sunbeam muttered abjectly, her golden eyes losing more of their cheerful glint.

"But we're not giving up. It's only the second day, and there's still so much ground to cover," Moonbeam said, hoping to sound somewhat optimistic.

"She's right. The world's a big big place, so it's not hard to see why you can't find them right off," Riko told them, agreeing with Moonbeam's sentiment.

"Yeah. We better go look again," Sunbeam said as she darted out the window.

"If anything happens, one of us will come and get you, okay?" Moonbeam told Riko. She didn't say anything in response, but Moonbeam had already flitted off before Riko could respond. Riko didn't mind though. She just went back to drawing more pictures of Twilight Cat.

She wanted to draw more, but she saw Rina come into her room. However, instead of giving her accusatory looks or yelling at her like she usually did, she looked rather disturbed, and she had a piece of paper in her hand.

"What's wrong, Rina?" Riko asked curiously.

"Sorry to bother you, but...can you help me with my homework?" Rina asked sadly as she showed Riko the worksheet. Riko looked over it, happy that it isn't math, as she's not very good at it. Surprisingly, it's about hiragana writing, and she could tell from the myriad of smeared ink and eraser marks that she's just not getting one of the new symbols wrong.

"What seems to be the problem?" Riko asked.

"I can't remember what _'ne'_ looks like. I know that one is _'re,'_ and _'ne'_ looks like it, but how do I tell the difference?" Rina explained, pointing to the hiragana symbol she was referring to.

"I see. It's not that hard to tell the difference. See, _'ne'_ is written like this," Riko said as she grabbed a pencil and wrote the hiragana symbol for ne. "See? _'Ne'_ is exactly like _'re,'_ but it has a little loop here, and the line is going inward. That better?" Riko explained, hoping Rina would understand.

Immediately, Rina's face beamed like a newly installed light bulb. "Ohhhh! I get it now! Yay! Thanks, Oneechan!" Rina cheered and hugged her big sister. Riko just turned her head away, focusing only on her Twilight Cat drawings. She definitely understood. Once Rina finished hugging Riko, she grabbed her homework and ran back into her room to finish it.

Her room's walls were painted white, and there were lots of Barbie dolls and stuffed animals laying all over her floor. A big unicorn plushie that was white with purple hair, blue marble eyes, black hooves, and a golden horn, sat on her bed like it was its throne. There were also some games and a game console lying on her bed as well. She had a little mahogany desk in her room, with a little chair to match. Rina put a cotton candy pink cushion on it to make it easier to sit on. Unlike Riko, Rina only had a few books on her desk, and lots of frilly clothes in her closet and drawers for a girl her age, like dresses, skirts, and anything that was new and trendy. There was also a tall mirror on the inside of her closet door, so she could dress up and see how she looks. After a few minutes, she filled out the last part of her worksheet.

"Yay! I'm done! I think I'll get an A on this one!" Rina cheered as she put the worksheet in her bookbag, zipped it up, and left it alone.

* * *

Hanae ran toward a clearing in the woods in tears, not realizing that she had gone in rather deep. But once she got tired enough, she stopped in front of a small, clear pond surrounded by little clover blossoms, and sat right down in front of it. She didn't care if she was lost at this point. She didn't care at all.

Her friend found out about her parents. She was sure the worst would happen, and she would never hear the end of it.

She looked down at the pond. It was perfectly pristine and lucid, so she was able to see herself in the reflection perfectly. A little girl with orange hair tied into little braids and deep brown eyes. But that wasn't what she saw. She saw someone who was ugly, worthless, stupid, and gross. None of this was true, but some kids at her last school always told her stuff like that...and as of now, she believed them.

She turned right around as soon as the bad memories flooded into her mind. She didn't want to see herself or anything else. The floodgates in her eyes were finally forced open, and the tears she had been trying so hard to hide popped right out. Birds flew away at the resulting wails. But she didn't care. Nobody was watching, and nobody could tell her to shut up or stop crying or get over it. She was alone, and that was great. She could do whatever she wanted if she was alone. Nobody would stop her.

Unfortunately for her, she wasn't alone.

"Huh?" Moonbeam's ears twitched as she flew, and she stopped in the air as soon as they did.

"What's up, Moonbeam?" Sunbeam asked, stopping once she noticed Moonbeam behind her.

"Do you hear someone crying?" Moonbeam asked.

"Hmm...huh. Now that you mention it, I do. But shouldn't finding Starbeam and Lovebeam be more important?" Sunbeam said.

"Yes. But I don't like turning my back on people who are sad. Who knows? Maybe it's one of them!" Moonbeam exclaimed as she flitted toward the woods. Sunbeam sighed and followed her. Once they got close enough, they hid in a bush in case anyone was around. It didn't take too long for them to find the source of the crying, which turned out to be Hanae. Sunbeam sighed.

"Gawww. It's just a little girl," Sunbeam complained.

"But I wonder why she's so sad?" Moonbeam asked, her concern still lingering.

"Beats me," Sunbeam said. She was about to fly away until an eerie feeling zipped up her spine like a rattlesnake. She looked up at a tree on the other side of the pond to find the source of it.

A person, with silver hair lying on one of the big branches, staring up at the evergreen leaves insouciantly, without a care in the world.

"Moonbeam. Look," Sunbeam tugged at her sister's fur and pointed to the tree. When Moonbeam saw who was on it, she almost yelped, but her paws flew to her mouth once she saw the figure lying on the big tree branch.

"Zenjin!" Moonbeam chirped.

Yes, it was none other than Zenjin lying on that big tree branch. But he wasn't doing anything or causing any trouble right now. He was just lying on the branch, staring at the trees. But just his presence was enough to make Moonbeam and Sunbeam freeze with fear.

"We need to stop him! If he finds out that girl is there, he might do something horrible to her or worse!" Sunbeam exclaimed as she was about to fly up to the tree where he's sitting, but Moonbeam grabbed one of her ears tightly.

"No! He's too powerful! You saw how we failed to stop him the last time!" Moonbeam piped in.

"But we can't just sit here and do nothing!" Sunbeam argued, surprised that her younger sister wasn't willing to take any action against Zenjin.

"I know that. I feel the same way you do. But we have to be rational. Think about it. This might be a good opportunity. If we stay quiet, we might be able to act without him knowing. You stay here and keep an eye on Zenjin and the little girl. I'll go and get Riko and have her help us," Moonbeam whispered quietly so as to not alert Zenjin to their presence.

"But Riko's a newbie! Sure she's a Pretty Cure, but she can't fight her way out of a paper bag!" Sunbeam argued in a hushed voice.

"There's no other option! It's better than nothing, right? Now stay here, and do NOT do anything rash or anything that'll attract their attention! Okay?" Moonbeam retorted sternly and flitted away to go and get Riko, leaving Sunbeam alone in the woods with Zenjin and Hanae, both unaware of their presence.

"Why doesn't she ever let me knock his lights out? He deserves it for what he's done!" Sunbeam grumbled irritably. The terrible memory of Rozaniela getting destroyed by his hand lingered in her brain again. The malicious, remorseless, guiltless look he had in his eyes was enough to make Sunbeam explode in anger that day.

Oh, how she yearned to make Zenjin pay for what he did to their precious home. How dare he thank them for their years of kindness by stealing the Energia, absorbing it, and leaving Rozaniela a complete mess! What did they do to deserve this? Sunbeam desperately wanted answers, and she knew staying here wasn't going to help her get any. But she knew that if she disobeyed Moonbeam, she'd leave them open for more of Zenjin's treachery, and possibly put an innocent life in danger. Rozaniela getting destroyed was bad enough already. Sunbeam couldn't bear to put Earth civilians through the same fate. Reluctantly, Sunbeam stayed quiet, hoping nothing would happen.

Unfortunately for her, her prayers weren't answered, as Hanae and Zenjin would end up noticing each other anyway.

Hanae picked up a rock that was nearby, stood up, and squeezed it with her hand, hoping to use it as an outlet for her sadness and rancor. But squeezing it wasn't enough. Her heart was still being attacked by conflicting feelings, and the sad look on her face made it clear that she didn't like what she was feeling. She threw the big rock toward the sky, hoping that throwing it would help in releasing some of her stress. But it didn't just fly toward the sky.

It fell right on the silver haired figure's head.

"OW!"

Sunbeam, witnessing this, allowed her paws to fly to her mouth. "Oh no!"

"Huh?" Hanae, surprised by the sound, looked up to find the silver haired person lying on a branch, sitting right up and rubbing his pulsating head in pain. He was there the whole time and she didn't notice until just now...and the rock she threw fell on his head! How could she have been so careless? Her mothers would surely be angry with her if they found out, even though it was an accident.

"Who threw that at me?!" Zenjin yelled angrily, like he had been insulted.

"I'm sorry! I didn't see you up there!" Hanae cried out, hoping to make amends with him and let him know that she didn't mean it. "It was an accident! Please don't be mad!"

Sadly for both Hanae and Sunbeam, Zenjin turned around and eyed the apologetic girl with a very hate-filled look on his pale white face. He wasn't just mad. He looked like he was about to explode in an unstoppable fit of homicidal rage!

Suddenly, Zenjin leaped off of the branch and landed right in front of Hanae, causing her to run back a few steps, surprised by the fact that he could jump like that, without stumbling into the pond or falling right in. Zenjin's anger did not simmer, not even as he met the frightened girl's gaze.

"You're going to pay for that, you trash!" Zenjin yelled as he threw a ball of purple light at her. Thankfully, Hanae evaded it and ran as fast as she could.

Unbeknownst to her or Zenjin, Sunbeam followed them to make sure nothing bad happens. He was a stranger, and she had it drilled into her head that if a stranger approached her or attacked her, she had no run no matter what...and that was exactly what she did. She ran as fast as she could, even though Zenjin was right on her tail. She made it to the street, but there was hardly anyone on it. But that didn't stop her. If there was nobody here, she'd find someone.

"Help! Someone help me! A stranger's attacking me!" Hanae yelled as loud as she could as she ran to the best of her ability, hoping it would get someone's attention. But no one answered her pleas. Before she could run any further, a thicket of vines suddenly wrapped around her, stopping her from running any further.

"No! Let me go!" Hanae yelled as she struggled to break free, but nothing worked. Zenjin had finally caught up with her. With a snap of his fingers, a big orange wall popped out from the street. The vines slammed her onto it and loosened up, allowing the steel restraints to appear and lock her in. Once the restraints kept her firmly on it, the vines disappeared, and a Soul Portal appeared in front of her. But before he could do anything…

"You leave her alone, you bully!" A yellow ray of light suddenly knocked him off his feet, causing him to fall on the concrete. Sunbeam appeared in between him and the mortally frightened Hanae, and she was NOT looking happy. Neither was Zenjin.

"Get out of my way, you orange trash!" Zenjin screamed, attempting to grab her. Sunbeam suddenly enveloped herself in a yellow light, flashing so bright that it blinded him to the point where he had to cover his eyes.

"You deal with ME! Leave her out of this!" Sunbeam yelled valiantly, like a knight in shining armor trying to protect its princess, only Sunbeam is a girl and a fairy, completely vulnerable with no armor of any form of defenses whatsoever. But she wasn't going to let that stop her from giving Zenjin a well-deserved piece of her mind in the form of a beatdown.

"Someone...HELP MEEEEE!" Hanae screamed as the brouhaha went on around her.

She thought no one would hear her pleas. But unbeknownst to her, someone did.

"Huh?" Hotaru stopped in the middle of a nearby street with her naginata on her back. She looked behind her, wondering if her imagination was playing tricks on her. But as it turned out, it wasn't. She heard very angry sounding voices coming from a few streets down. Was there a fight going on? Was someone being attacked?

"Over here! I see them, Riko-chan!"

Then, Hotaru saw Moonbeam and Riko run toward that part of the street.

'_Is she…? No! She can't!'_ Hotaru thought with concern and worry consuming her like a tsunami. She ran after Moonbeam and Riko.

As for Sunbeam...things aren't going well. Despite her best efforts, Zenjin threw another ray of light at her, throwing her against a tree. After that, he wasted absolutely no time in walking up to the mortally frightened and helpless Hanae, grabbing her Soul Portal, and shoving his face in it, resulting in Hanae screaming and crying louder than any other time in her life. She struggled and tried to break free, but nothing was working, and she was in too much pain to do anything more. After a couple seconds, Zenjin pulled his face out of it, but his anger didn't subside.

"You think you've got it rough? How arrogant! My suffering is far greater than yours, you selfish tramp!" Zenjin yelled as he put his hand in the Soul Portal and tried to grab her soul.

All of a sudden, he found himself struck by a very strong blow, causing him to fall to the ground again. But like before, he was successful in yanking out Hanae's soul. When he got up, he found feet pressing on his body and a naginata whose blade is dangerously close to his face.

Hotaru was standing on him, not letting him go for one second. She stared him down with a very angry and courageous glint in her eyes, with the naginata at his face like she wanted to slash him.

"If you know what's good for you, I suggest you leave this poor girl alone!" Hotaru exclaimed bravely.

Right then and there, Riko and Moonbeam arrived on the scene, and stopped as soon as they saw Hotaru standing on top of Zenjin, threatening her with her naginata. Immediately, Riko became fearful. _'Oh no! What's she doing here?! I can't transform if she's around! But she probably...knows about Zenjin's powers...'_ Riko stammered fearfully.

All of a sudden, the orb in Zenjin's hands floated into the air and grew to a very large size, not unlike the giant fox from that other time. But instead of turning into a giant black fox, it's now a giant black ostrich. As soon as they saw the transformation, Zenjin knocked Hotaru off of him and flew away.

"Come back heeeere!" Sunbeam tried to go after him, but she was too weak to give chase.

"_Why do I have...two moms? Why don't I have a dad like everyone else?!"_ The black ostrich yelled as it suddenly dashed into town.

"That's...that girl's voice!" Hotaru exclaimed. She turned around to find the unconscious Hanae lying on the ground with her Soul Portal bare and exposed. She scooped the girl in her arms and turned to look at Riko, who froze upon seeing her.

Riko thought she was looking at her with a suspicious, hate-filled look until Hotaru opened her mouth. "Aren't you going to transform?" She asked.

"Uh...what?" Riko asked, confused. But she had an idea of what she was talking about, and this was what she feared the most.

"You ARE Cure Twilight, aren't you?" Hotaru said.

Riko wanted to scream. She really wanted to, but she couldn't. All she could croak out was, "How...how do you know?!" If she saw her, she knew she couldn't lie to her.

"I was taking a stroll, and I saw you transform. It's okay. I'm not mad. Come on. This girl needs your help!" Hotaru said.

Knowing what was at stake, Riko shrugged her fears off of her, pulled out her purple Heart Lighter, and quickly transformed into Cure Twilight. Now Hotaru knew about her.

"How do we catch up to that big ostrich?" Riko asked.

"Oh! I know!" Moonbeam exclaimed. She tapped on the clip of her bow, and out came a little piece of candy wrapped in a rainbow colored wrapper.

"What's this?" Riko asked.

"It's Empowerment Candy! It's a type of candy that gives you more powers! But different colors give you different powers. That yellow one will give you super speed and super strength! But it only lasts for a little while though," Moonbeam exclaimed as Riko undid the wrapper and found the yellow candy inside.

"Might as well give it a try," Riko said as she wrapped her free hand around Hotaru's arm and ate the yellow candy. Moonbeam and Sunbeam clung to her as soon as she ate it. Then, completely out of nowhere, Riko glowed in a yellow light and literally zipped out of the area so fast she thought she had turned invisible. She wasn't sure where she was going, and how to stop for that matter.

"Yeeeeeeek! How do I stoooooop?! I'm going tooooo faaaaaast!" Riko screamed, unable to comprehend the fact that she's going faster than she ever did before and the fact that her body wasn't giving out from running so much.

All of a sudden, she stopped glowing and running, finding herself to be quite out of breath. She was surprised to find that she dragged Moonbeam, Sunbeam, Hotaru, and the unconscious Hanae along with her. Once she regained her composure, she found herself and the others a couple streets down from the school.

"Why are we at my school?" Riko asked.

"Look! There's the ostrich!" Sunbeam exclaimed, which prompted everyone to get into defensive stances.

"_I want a dad! Now everyone knows I have two moms, and they're gonna bully me forever!'_ The black ostrich screamed in Hanae's voice as it suddenly stopped in front of a dark brown house. As soon as it approached the house, Hisako came out through the front door, followed by Miki.

"What's going on out here?!" Hisako yelped, then screamed once she saw the giant ostrich looming over them with a look that literally screamed intent to kill.

Hotaru's eyes widened. "No!" Hotaru yelled as she put Hanae in a safe spot, got her naginata out and leaped onto the ostrich's rear end. She managed to climb on its back before it felt her presence, and once it did, it started shaking out of control, hoping to throw her off. But Hotaru clung to its fur tightly with just one hand, with her naginata in her other hand.

"_They should die! It's their fault everybody hates me!"_ The ostrich yelled as he tried to shoo Hotaru off of its back. But instead of getting thrown off, Hotaru took her naginata and stabbed the ostrich in the back, causing it to roar in pain. But nothing came out of the wound though, because the naginata wasn't shoved in too deep. Riko, not wanting to stand by, decided to help out. She got her claws out and leaped toward the roaring ostrich.

"Cat Slash!" She slashed the ostrich's face with her claws and it roared in pain, allowing Hotaru to cling to its neck and give it a kick right on its throat. She then hopped off and proceeded to cut one of the ostrich's legs with her naginata, this time giving it a fresh wound. Riko then leaped toward it and gave it a few punches and kicks, but it wasn't enough to completely render the giant black ostrich helpless. However, it got back up, knocked Riko against a tree, and ran toward the brown house.

Aiming right for Hisako and Miki.

"No! Don't!" Hotaru yelled.

"_It's all your fault...you're the reason everyone picks on me at school! You should DIE!"_ The ostrich yelled angrily and was about to swallow the frightened Hisako and Miki. But Hotaru, despite being injured, ran in between them and aimed her naginata at the gigantic beak.

However, this valiant attempt at saving them was in vain, as the ostrich yanked the naginata out of her hand (Hotaru let go so she wouldn't get dragged with it) and threw it away like it was trash. It looked like it was about to come and attack them again, but this time, it didn't. Instead, the ostrich just kept looking away, like it was trying really hard to suppress the urge to kill. Hotaru even saw something she never expected to see out of a monster.

Tears.

"Hanae…" Hotaru muttered softly to herself once Hisako and Miki toward the spot where Hanae's vessel is laying. Not even Riko and the fairies could believe their eyes. The ostrich is actually crying!

"_NO! I don't wanna kill my parents! So what if I don't have a dad?! At least...they love me! They love me, do stuff with me, and help me with my homework! I...I can't kill my moms! They love me! I shouldn't...be doing this!"_ The ostrich cried desperately, like it was yearning for someone to end its suffering. It kept on shaking like a leaf.

Hotaru clenched her fists and looked up at the ostrich with a courageous yet warm glint in her eyes...and a smile. "You're right! You're absolutely right, Hanae! There's nothing wrong with having two moms or two dads!"

A memory played in Hotaru's mind. _"Dad! Kyouichi! Look! Look! I got an A on my science test!"_ An eleven-year-old Hotaru cried happily, leaping into Kyouichi's arms.

_"That's wonderful, Hotaru! I knew you could do it!"_ One male voice exclaimed happily. The man picked Hotaru up and spun her around in the air.

_"It's a good thing we studied together, didn't we?"_ Another man asked in a softer voice as he pulled his head out of a newspaper.

* * *

"What?!" Starbeam, as she sat down on a bush to take a rest, suddenly found something in her ribbon glowing in an ocean blue light. "The Heart Lighter's reacting!" She exclaimed, surprised.

The blue light popped out from her ribbon, increased in size somewhat, and suddenly darted away like it was a hummingbird who was trying to go over the mountains in a big hurry. Starbeam was suddenly left alone again.

"Wait! Heart Lighter! Don't leave me here!" Starbeam stammered as she tried to fly after it, but she found herself to be far too exhausted to continue on, falling on the grass as a result.

Starbeam had no idea where the Heart Lighter was headed. But it knew where it wanted to go.

It took a few minutes for it to arrive, but it appeared right in front of Hotaru. Understandably, everyone became quite confused. The blue light appeared in front of Hotaru, dissipated, and out came a pretty, blue, glass, star-shaped perfume bottle. But instead of a heart shaped cap, it had a star shaped cap on it. Then the blue Heart Lighter itself glowed in a radiant blue light. Hotaru grabbed it, twisted the star shaped cap, and yanked it off. Then, a light left the Heart Lighter and floated in front of her. As soon as she touched it, the light dissipated, and out came a little blue star shaped jewel. The blue Heart Lighter glowed for a bit, then the light dissipated, leaving a hollow, star shaped cavity in the middle of it.

Riko had seen this before. She knew what it meant.

"Minamigawa-san! Put that jewel in the hole in that perfume bottle!" Riko commanded.

"I don't get it, but...I might as well do it, if it means saving Hanae!" Hotaru exclaimed courageously as she put the jewel inside.

Just like with Riko before her, Hotaru got swallowed up by a large, blue light. But she wasn't afraid at all. In fact, she seemed to be thrilled.

"Pretty Cure, let the light shine!" She shouted as she held the Heart Lighter in the air. The star object dissolved into the perfume bottle, not only filling in the gap, but filling the bottle with a kind of translucent lavender liquid.

Just like Riko did, Hotaru spun around in circles and sprayed it all over herself, but she did it in a more swift and elegant way. As soon as the perfume made contact with her normal clothes, they changed completely! Instead of her black skinny jeans, purple and pinkish purple smock with a big red ribbon on the front and medium length sleeves, brown laced boots, and her silver hooped earrings, Hotaru found herself donning a sleeveless blue and white tank top with blue stars going down the chest part, with no straps or anything of the sort, along with some lacy, pointed white frills on each side of them and with a pair of darker blue shorts. A large, dark blue ribbon appeared on her shirt with a shiny pale blue star on it. On both of her arms are armbands with white lace frills and stars circling them. A small, pale blue, blanket-like cloth with darker blue pockets on each side wrapped around her waist, with the ends connected to the front by a pale blue star belt-like decoration. Dangling from both of her ears are large, silver hoop earrings with three little pale blue stars dangling from the bottom of them both. Her raven black hair suddenly got dyed blue, like the ocean, but it was still kept in a braid, only with a lighter blue ribbon at the end. A pale blue hair clip shaped like a star with a white wing hanging from it clipped onto part of her bangs. A blue star tattoo appeared on her left shoulder. She is now wearing a pair of very tall, dark blue boots, going just a little below her knees, with lighter blue stars on them, and they each donned pairs of little white wings on each boot. Her Heart Lighter dangled from her shorts like a key chain. Dark blue, fingerless gloves covered her hands. But unlike Riko, she doesn't have any animal-like decorations on her costume. Soon, the light dissipated, bringing her back to earth, looking very radiant, like the stars in the night sky.

"She's...she's a Pretty Cure now?! Awesome!" Riko exclaimed happily.

"One of the Heart Lighters resonated with her! Of course she's a Pretty Cure!" Sunbeam exclaimed with a big smile.

Riko expected her to react badly to the news that she's an official Pretty Cure, or the fact that she suddenly turned into a random superhero at all. But much to her surprise, Hotaru wasn't phased by her new transformation at all. She wasn't even scared. She didn't question it at all. She just relished the fact that she was now a Pretty Cure.

She smiled as she made her entrance. "I am the lights that illuminate the darkness, Cure Starlight!" Hotaru exclaimed as she struck a pose resembling that of a model strut.

"Cure Starlight...that sounds pretty!" Riko muttered to herself, awestruck by Hotaru becoming a Pretty Cure.

"How lovely!" Moonbeam mused sweetly, in awe of Cure Starlight's elegant and majestic entrance.

She wasted no time getting in on the action. She jumped toward the ostrich and landed a massive kick, causing it to finally fall to the ground. The ostrich tried to get back up, but Cure Starlight decided to assault it with a flurry of punches and kicks, making sure it doesn't have the strength to do anything at all. The ostrich tried to peck at her, but she grabbed its beak and pushed it away. She then did a back flip on its back and proceeded to smack it upside the head with a rather strong punch, causing it to black out. The ostrich struggled to stand back up, but Hotaru hopped off of its back.

"Starlight Kick!" She then landed a massive kick on one of the ostrich's legs, causing it to trip and fall. Thankfully for everyone there, it didn't fall on anything like trees or houses or anything despite being so close. But Hotaru wasn't done yet. She raised her hands into the sky like she was praying for the Gods to appear. Instead of Gods appearing, a myriad of pale blue, star shaped lights rained down on the ostrich and everything around it like a meteor shower.

"Starlight Shower!" The stars rained on the ostrich, cutting its skin and going right into it. The ostrich then became consumed by a pale blue light, which then dissipated into the air once the star shower ended, leaving only a glass orb. Cure Twilight, who transformed back into Riko, was quick to grab it.

"I'm gonna put this back inside the girl. Kay?" Riko said.

"Sure," Hotaru said once she transformed back to her normal self.

Slowly and gently, Riko placed the orb back into the Soul Portal, which disappeared as soon as it went inside. Immediately, Hanae's color returned, and she regained consciousness.

"Hana-chan! Oh, thank goodness you're okay!" Hisako exclaimed as she squeezed Hanae like she hadn't seen her in a long time. For Hanae, instead of feeling embarrassed or angry, she felt warm and happy, brimming with love. Once they were done, she walked up to Hotaru with gratitude in her deep brown eyes.

"Thank you for saving me, miss. I'm sorry I didn't say thanks earlier," Hanae told her shyly and bowed.

"It's no big deal. Really. But you're extremely lucky that you have such great parents. Other kids don't have parents who love them at all, and it doesn't matter if you don't have the same kind of parents as everyone else," Hotaru told her gently.

Hanae smiled brightly and went off with her two mothers. Riko watched them go inside their house with a smile as well. But as soon as they went in, her smile dissipated and she stared down at the concrete she's standing on rather dejectedly. Hotaru wound up noticing as soon as she turned around. Feeling concerned, she ambled up to the dejected girl and kneeled in front of her.

"What's wrong, Riko?" Hotaru asked kindly, in a soft whisper.

"You're new at the whole Pretty Cure thing like me, yet...you're so much better than me," Riko murmured a little sadly.

"How so?" Hotaru asked, confused. She tilted her head to one side, flummoxed by what Riko is saying.

"You fight better than me, you took the ostrich down more easily than I could ever do, you didn't destroy any houses, and best of all...nobody hates you because you saved them...unlike me," Riko muttered, remembering the angry faces of the townspeople.

"I wouldn't say that. While it is true that you handled the incident with the giant fox a little haphazardly, that's understandable since nobody knows how to be a superhero in real life, and sometimes even when we do try to be careful, circumstances tend to make things worse than they already are. Please don't think everything that goes wrong is your fault," Hotaru said.

"It's true, especially considering what Zenjin is capable of," Sunbeam piped in reassuringly.

"You're not freaked out about being a superhero?" Riko asked curiously.

"A little bit, yes, but I think I can get used to this," Hotaru replied with a smile.

"Minamigawa-san-"

"We're friends and allies now, Riko. Feel free to call me Hotaru."

"Hotaru-san…"

"Good enough."

"By the way, where did your Heart Lighter come from?" Moonbeam asked. "Last I checked, Starbeam is the one who has the blue Heart Lighter."

Sunbeam gasped. "That must mean...Starbeam must be nearby!" Sunbeam shouted and suddenly darted away like she was in a hurry.

"Wait for me, Sunbeam!" Moonbeam pleaded as she gave chase.

"What's going on with them?" Hotaru asked.

"I'll explain later," Riko told her.

* * *

"Seriously! Why can't those blasted Pretty Cures let me have my fun?!" Zenjin exclaimed as he flew far away from the clearing and made it to another area of the woods. He found another tree he could sit on, this time a much bigger and thicker one. Once he laid down on a big branch, he looked up at the big, thick, evergreen leaves with a somewhat insouciant look on his pale little face. He raised his hand into the sky, looking like he wanted to touch it, but he knew it was out of his reach. However, his mind was somewhere else.

"My powers...this Energia thing must be more powerful than I thought. I oughta test it out some more, just to see what more it can do. If I perfect them some more, maybe I can do so much more than just corrupt one soul at a time. I'll get much closer to finding..._her_…" Zenjin muttered to himself. Suddenly, an image flashed through his mind. It looked like a rather fat and dumpy woman with sagging skin on her arms, long, messy, muddy dark brown hair that looked like it hadn't been washed in days, and bloodshot eyes. He couldn't make out her face though. He rubbed his face with his glove-covered hands.

"But how am I gonna find her when I don't remember anything about this world? I oughta at least familiarize myself with it...since it's been so long…" Zenjin said to himself. _'I'll spend the night here. At least nobody will bother me...'_ He thought as he decided to make this tree his turf for the day.

One had to wonder what exactly was going through his young mind.

* * *

"You never told us you had two moms, Hana-chan!" Yuiko said the next day, accompanied by two other girls.

Hanae nodded. "I was afraid that if you or anyone else found out, you'd not wanna be my friend anymore."

"That's silly!" One girl exclaimed. "We think your moms are cool!"

Hanae looked up with surprise. "Really?"

"Yeah!" Another girl chimed in. "Is it true Hisako-san works at a bakery? Do you think she'll give us free cake if we go?"

"We don't hate you or your moms. That'd be stupid," Yuiko told her. "Hey. Can we come over your house this week? We can watch Pretty Cure together!"

Hanae found herself smiling so big her face hurt. Instead of feeling ashamed, she was aglow with happiness.


	4. Starbeam is Found! So is Cure Dawn!

Chapter 4: Starbeam is Found! So is Cure Dawn!

Unfortunately for the two fairies, despite their knowledge that Starbeam was the one responsible for the blue Heart Lighter, they couldn't find their sister, partly because their injuries still kept them from going too far, and partly because there were people around to observe the scene where the giant ostrich attacked. They didn't want to get caught, so they figured they should give up for today.

Hotaru decided to go home on her own despite the commotion. She found the walk to be quite relaxing once she got further and further away from the commotion, and listening to her I-Pod playing classical pieces by Vivaldi definitely helped knock the stress out of her system, as she really needed to get all that stress from beating up the giant ostrich out.

Hotaru was quite in awe of what just happened. A giant ostrich, or to be more specific, the manifestation of Hanae's corrupted soul, tried to attack her parents, and she turned into some anime superhero and defeated it all on her own. It was understandable that Riko found her to be amazing, even before she became a Pretty Cure, but...Hotaru wasn't quite sure if she was really as amazing and awesome as Riko claims she is. Her insides were doing back flips and her head was throbbing due to all the jumping, kicking, and punching. She was surprised she even managed to survive something like that. But she was still happy that they saved Hanae and helped her reconcile with her parents.

A little later, Hotaru arrived in front of a cobalt blue house with a slanted pale gray roof, and an old white rocking chair sitting on the porch. She saw some pots of flowers sitting on the porch, like petunias.

"I'm back!" Hotaru called out when she entered her house.

"Hotaru-chan! Is that you?" A man suddenly darted in front of her with worry consuming his deep blue eyes. "I'm so glad you're safe! I heard about the commotion in town. You're not hurt, are you?"

"No. I'm okay, Dad," Hotaru told him with a smile as she hugged him. He hugged her back, albeit a little tighter than she liked.

"I'd never forgive myself if anything happened to you, my little firefly," Hotaru's father told her as he squeezed her like he didn't want to ever let her go. Soon, she pried herself out of his well intentioned and loving grasp.

"Where's Kyouichi at?" Hotaru asked.

"He's out in the backyard working on his go kart. I swear, I don't know how he manages to spend so much time on those things and not act like he's crazier than those guys I deal with at the restaurant!" Hotaru's first father exclaimed. "Oh! I better get started on dinner. We're having chicken alfredo today!" He said cheerfully as he went to the kitchen and decided to work on dinner.

Hotaru went into her room and decided to work on some homework. It was a perfectly clean room, with a window overlooking her backyard, where she could watch her second father working vigorously on his go kart. Her bed was perfectly flat, neat, and tidy, covered with a pale blue bed sheet. There were a few stuffed animals and many books about astronomy and planets sitting on it. A little next to her window was a big, black telescope sitting on a silver and black tripod. She sat down at her white desk, pulled out some worksheets, pulled out a green mechanical pencil, and began working on them. But the images of everything that happened today still lingered in her mind.

'_Pretty Cure...Cure Starlight...monsters...I wonder if I can really handle it? How can I balance it with school and naginata practice and...the rest of my life?'_ Hotaru thought as she finished the first three problems on her worksheet without any difficulty. _'Well, I don't think it's something I can really control, as we won't know when something else will happen. If I ever see Riko-chan again, I'll ask her about everything that's been happening. We didn't get to exchange cell numbers,'_ She finished two more problems. Soon, her homework was done.

* * *

As soon as Riko hopped out of the car and came onto the blacktop, the first thing she heard was the sound of a harmonica. A very light, cheery, and energetic sound it was. Remembering what Kyoya said about it before, she decided to look on the blacktop to see if she could find the person playing it.

As it turned out, she didn't have to take too long in finding the person, because the musician turned out to be Anzu, leaning against the metal fence on the far left corner of the blacktop, contentedly playing some country song on the little metal bar like it was the best thing in the world. Riko, seeing the serene joy on her pale, bespectacled face, decided to be quiet and just watch her play. She didn't recognize the song, but she liked how it sounded. After a couple minutes, Anzu stopped playing and put her harmonica in her pocket.

"That was great, An-chan!" Riko exclaimed happily, in awe of Anzu's talent.

"Thanks. Glad you like it, Riko-chan," Anzu replied with a cheerful, perky looking smile.

"What song is that?" Riko asked curiously.

"I forget the name, but it's by Johnny Cash. He's an American country music singer. He's dead now, but he writes really good music," Anzu explained. "My dad really likes his work."

"Never heard of him. But still, you're really good at the harmonica," Riko told her with her own smile.

"Thanks. I kinda like it," Anzu said sheepishly.

They didn't get to talk for much longer though, because the bell rang and everyone scrambled to get into homeroom. When Riko sat down to read her manga, she heard the sound of someone talking and turned to look. The source of the voice was a girl about her age, sitting with two other girls, with raven black hair like herself but it went down to her upper back, tied into flouncy little pigtails held up by pink pearl-like hair clips. The girl had pale blue eyes, like a clear morning sky. Today the girl was wearing a black and white striped tank top, a ruffled purplish pink miniskirt, and brown sandals. The girl was talking quite loudly and Riko, having hypersensitive hearing, couldn't help but overhear, even though more than anything, she wanted to NOT hear.

"Ugh! I can't believe someone found our burn book and told the principal! Whoever it is, I oughta punch her lights out!" The girl yelled loudly, which made Riko cover her ears. But it didn't block out the entire conversation.

"We didn't snitch, Yoshie! We swear!" One frumpy pale brown haired girl exclaimed fearfully.

'_So SHE'S that Inoue girl Kyo-chan talks about,'_ Riko thought, keeping herself silent so she wouldn't get their attention.

"I really don't see what's so _'troubling'_ about it. A girl needs to vent somehow. I don't see why I can't talk about other people! A lot of what we wrote in there is true, y'know!" The pigtailed girl, Yoshie, complained loudly with a screechy, high pitched voice, like a perfect drama queen. "And because of that snitch, we have detention twice a week for six weeks! And this is only the first week of school!"

"I'm sorry for dropping it, Yoshie," The dark brown haired, bespectacled girl muttered sadly. "I didn't even know I lost it until after the principal called us to his office."

"It's alright, Shizuka-chan. You didn't know," The lighter brown haired girl told her friend Shizuka.

"Why are you feeling bad for her, Toshiko?! It's her fault the principal got the Burn Book!" Yoshie yelled, scaring Shizuka and Toshiko into cowering in their seats. "But still! He didn't have to give us detention! And I can't believe what he said to us!" Yoshie proceeded to imitate the principal's gravely voice. "_'We cannot have something as troubling as this on school grounds. We have a zero tolerance policy about bullying, Inoue. If I catch you doing something like this again, stricter measures will have to be taken. You're lucky I'm giving you a detention this time around.'_ He made it sound like I started a nuclear war! He didn't have to make such a big deal out of it!"

Riko knew that if they found out she was the one who told them about their Burn Book, they'd automatically declare her public enemy number one and probably demonize her and bully her for the rest of her life. But then again, they'd probably bully her and demonize her anyway. Riko didn't think it was possible to avoid them no matter what she'd try.

But she did notice something else about Yoshie: her tank top, miniskirt, and sandals. She read the dress code. Tank tops, miniskirts, and sandals aren't allowed in school. It didn't seem like the teachers noticed.

She wasn't going to let this Inoue girl get away with violating the dress code.

Very slowly and carefully, she got up from her seat and walked over to the teacher's desk. Her homeroom teacher, Omori Seiko, had proven to be a rather nice lady so far, with beautiful, curling caramel hair that looked like gravy trailing down to her shoulders, chocolate brown eyes, and rather casual style of dress, wearing hoodies and jeans like high schoolers would, but not in a gangster-like way.

"Omori-sensei," Riko whispered.

"Hm? What's up, Riko-chan?" Mrs. Omori asked.

"I don't think you've noticed yet. Yoshie's wearing a tank top, miniskirt, and sandals. You're not supposed to wear those in school, right?" Riko whispered as low as she could muster, but loud enough for Mrs. Omori to hear. Mrs. Omori glanced over at Yoshie, who really was wearing a tank top, miniskirt, and sandals. What Riko didn't know was that Yoshie just so happened to glance right over to where they are.

"Thanks. I'll take care of it," Mrs. Omori replied. Riko quietly returned to her seat, hoping she did some good. What she didn't know was that Yoshie was watching her every move. All of a sudden, Mrs. Omori approached the overly curious Yoshie.

"Inoue-san? Can I see you outside?" Mrs. Omori asked sternly.

"Why?" Yoshie asked back.

"Just come with me into the hall," Mrs. Omori said. Yoshie pouted silently and followed the austere teacher out into the hall. As soon as they were alone, Mrs. Omori crossed her arms and stared down at the confused girl with a very unmerciful look in her eyes. "You know tank tops, miniskirts, and sandals are against the school dress code, Inoue-san. I want you to go to the principal's office, call your parents, and ask them to give you proper clothes to wear."

"Why can't I wear these? I like them! Why are they against the dress code?" Yoshie complained petulantly.

"I don't want your feet getting hurt, and it's unsightly to wear shirts with straps that small and skirts of that length. It's just not appropriate," Mrs. Omori told her.

"I don't see why it's not appropriate! I've been waiting too long to finally be able to wear stuff like this! I don't get to wear stuff I actually like very often!" Yoshie yelled even more petulantly, her screechy voice developing a very unsubtle whine to it, much to the teacher's barely disguised chagrin.

"Don't give me that attitude, young lady! Now go to the principal's office and call your parents. You'll be forbidden from going to class until you put on something proper. Now, march!" Mrs. Omori scolded angrily and pointed in the direction where the principal's office was. Yoshie, knowing that arguing with this stern woman would only make things worse, reluctantly stomped to the principal's office, her sandals making squeak noises as she stamped them onto the floor step by step. "Pick up your feet when you walk!" Mrs. Omori exclaimed.

"Oh, be quiet!" Yoshie whined as she went into the principal's office.

Everything in homeroom went fine as usual. "I'll bet Inoue's in trouble," Kyoya piped in as he wheeled over to Riko and Anzu.

"She's not supposed to wear tank tops, miniskirts, and sandals. It's against the dress code," Riko said.

"That explains it. I was never fond of those kinda things," Anzu said.

"She deserves it," Another voice piped in, but it didn't belong to Kyoya or Anzu. The three of them looked around to suddenly find Marina sitting next to them, staring at the hallway door as Mrs. Omori came back into the classroom. "Who still wears skirts of that length? Don't people have any sense of decency? It's bad enough some people wear their pants so low we can see their undies! It's so gross!"

"Yay! Somebody who agrees with me!" Riko suddenly cheered out of nowhere. She never expected to have something in common with the orange haired girl who picked on her a few days ago.

Kyoya's found himself aghast. Riko actually found common ground with someone who picked on her? Was she serious? He wondered if this was the same girl he befriended. But upon further thinking, Marina did stop picking on them since the first day. Perhaps she's serious about turning over a new leaf. But he didn't want to count his chickens before they hatched. Even more oddly, Marina smiled in response to that.

"Glad to hear it," Marina piped in with an unusually soft, kind-looking smile. Her gold eyes no longer donned that angry, wild animal-like look they had before. Riko didn't notice this, however.

After that, everyone went to their classes and went about their day. For the most part, the day went fine. But math lessons began for Riko, which she dreaded since she hates math with the fury of a thousand bob cats, as she likes to put it. However, so far the math lessons were easy, and she made sure to take lots of notes in class, like she always does, though she wasn't so sure if the notes will do her any good at all. Not only that, at least Mr. Ikari was nice and explained things people didn't understand.

Lunch time finally came and Riko got to relax. Not only that, Kyoya and Anzu sat at her table now, and they chattered about anything they could think of as they consumed their lunch. Riko couldn't help but notice that her food tasted a lot better and that the atmosphere around her felt more warm and welcoming than when she sat alone. She wondered if being friends with Kyoya and Anzu was the cause of it.

'_Having friends around sure is wonderful. I wish I had moments like these when I was younger,'_ Riko thought happily as she watched Kyoya and Anzu literally light up their lunch table with their cheer.

"Hey, Kyoya. That girl with the brown hair's been watching us a lot lately," Anzu suddenly piped in out of nowhere, pointing to a table off to their left with her fork.

Riko and Kyoya turned around to find a girl their age sitting with a few other girls and boys, who looked away as soon as they saw her. Her hair was a neutral but brilliant shade of chocolate brown, and it went down to her upper back, with a little ponytail dangling from the back of her head supported by a dark green scrunchie. She also had little sparkly green earrings shaped like clovers on both her ear lobes. Kyoya turned right around as soon as she did.

"Who is she?" Riko asked curiously.

"I think her name is Dounowaki. Didn't you used to be friends with her, Kyoya?" Anzu replied, then asked Kyoya, who ate the rest of his lunch looking rather grumpy, if he knew her.

"Just drop it. She's not worth our time," Kyoya muttered rather irritably as he finished the rest of his lunch. Riko could tell from the irritated tone of his voice that it was a rather sensitive subject, so she and Anzu decided to drop it right then and there so as to not push his buttons.

However, despite respecting Kyoya's wishes, Riko still felt curious. Was she his friend? Girlfriend? Crush? If they were friends, why don't they hang out anymore? If they were boyfriend and girlfriend, did they break up? And why did they break up? Questions lingered in her mind like fish in a pond. She didn't want to make Kyoya more angry, so she kept her mouth shut. However, as soon as recess came around, Kyoya was back to his mellow, cheerful, humorous self. Anzu played her harmonica next to them in peace as Kyoya and Riko talked amongst themselves.

"Hey, Ri-chan?"

"Yeah?"

"I was wondering...I notice that whenever people talk to you, us included, you never look at them in the face. You always look away when people talk to you. Why is that?"

"Uhh...I dunno. I just do," Riko stammered shyly, a little abashed by his random question. "I'm not trying to be mean or anything."

"I know. I was just curious, that's all," Kyoya told her with a smile.

"Also, I kinda have a question, too. Would...you mind if I...called you...Kyo-chan?" Riko stammered even more shyly this time with her own question. But as soon as she asked it, worries began flooding her mind. _'Oh no! Did I ask something stupid again? What if he doesn't like silly nicknames? I should have kept my mouth shut!'_ Riko cried in her head frightfully, wondering if she pushed his buttons. Thankfully for her, she didn't.

"Sure! I kinda miss being referred to by a nickname, so go right ahead!" Kyoya exclaimed cheerfully, his sweet smile returning in full force, quite a contrast to his irritability just mere minutes ago. Riko beamed. She could actually call someone a nickname! And they don't mind! She wondered if the gears of fate were finally turning in her favor. Good things are actually happening to her at last!

"Oh! An-chan! Have you heard of Hinata Sun Child?" Riko asked Anzu.

Anzu stopped playing her harmonica. "Sort of. But I never got to read it. I've been meaning to for a while now."

Riko clasped her hands together and beamed. "I have volume one with me! You can read it if you want! I'll be back!" Riko chirped happily before running to the bleachers to get her book out of her purse. Riko got her book out and tried to leave, but someone appeared in front of her.

Riko froze. _'It's that Inoue girl from earlier! Oh no!'_ She thought fearfully, her body stiffening with fright. Yoshie folded her arms together and gave Riko a dirty look. This time, she was wearing a red long sleeved shirt, blue jeans, and baby blue tennis shoes. But Riko shook off her fear and tried to get past Yoshie. Yoshie wouldn't let her. She kept on getting in her way.

Riko found herself irritated. "Excuse me!"

Yoshie didn't say anything.

"If someone says excuse me, that means you have to move!" Riko told her bluntly, even though in the back of her mind, she knew this pigtailed girl wouldn't get the message.

"I have a bone to pick with you, Tasogare Riko!" Yoshie sneered.

"Go pick someone else's bone! I'm not interested! Excuse me, please," Riko tried to get past Yoshie again, but the pig tailed girl was quite persistent and wouldn't let her leave. "Hey! I said please!"

"Think I care? Now fess up! You're the one who found my Burn Book, didn't you?! You better admit it, you snitch! I saw you talking to Omori-sensei earlier, telling her about my clothes!" Yoshie snapped.

Riko couldn't tell her the truth. She didn't want to risk being her target. She needed to get away, and fast. "MOVE!"

"Not until you confess!"

"Hey! Lay off, Inoue!" Kyoya rolled onto the scene, with Anzu right behind him. Riko took this chance to get past Yoshie and stand next to Anzu.

Yoshie gave them a disgusted look. "I don't need to listen to you losers!" She shouted. All of a sudden, she found something pulling on her hood. She turned around to find Marina gripping it rather tightly, with a very disappointed look on her face.

"Will you be quiet? Your annoying voice is making my ears bleed," Marina told her venomously, locking the girl in place with a harsh glare.

"Oh great! The Asagi Shouji clone has come to contaminate our breathing air! You'll get arrested if you attack me! You're gonna end up in jail just like your stupid dad!" Yoshie sneered virulently. Riko, Kyoya, and Anzu looked at each other with their eyes so wide they all looked like they were about to pop right out of their sockets.

"It's your own fault for violating the dress code! Can't you suck it up and get over it?" Marina retorted, completely unfazed by Yoshie's comment. "If you know what's good for you, then go away!"

"You stay out of my business! Nobody wants a criminal's kid walking around on school ground!"

"Stop!" Riko got in between Yoshie and Marina with a stern look in her eyes. "You should never say stuff like that!"

"I can say whatever the heck I want, stupid!" Yoshie snapped, but Riko didn't lose her cool.

"Anyone who calls people stupid is the stupid one, and don't think you're so cool just because you insult everybody and write in all in a magazine clipping covered book, and don't you dare say it's funny because to some people, it's NOT!" Riko yelled. But as soon as she yelled that, she gasped and immediately put her hands over her mouth upon realizing what she just did.

'_OH NO! I blabbed about the Burn Book! Stupid stupid STUPID Riko! Why do you have to run your big fat mouth?!'_ Riko screamed in her brain. Now everyone would know, and Yoshie and possibly other kids who hate her will likely pick on her and continually harass her for the rest of her life.

Riko could literally feel Yoshie's bloodshot pale blue eyes squint ferociously. Before Yoshie could do anything, one of the teachers appeared to ask what was going on. Funnily enough, Marina was the one who told him everything and literally handed Yoshie to him. The teacher, understandably angry, dragged the petulant girl to the principal's office yet again. Yoshie kept on whining, but the kids didn't bother to pay any attention to it. They just wanted to get back to their day.

"Sorry about that. You okay?" Marina asked in a low but concerned voice. The stern look in her goldenrod eyes disappeared, replaced with worry.

"Sorta. Thanks. But I ran my mouth again, and now she's gonna hate me forever and ever and ever and ever," Riko muttered sadly, thinking that Yoshie, now that she knows that she told the principal about the Burn Book, was possibly going to ruin every aspect of her school life in every way possible and will likely take a lot of glee in it, like Zenjin does in making people suffer.

"Don't worry about that drama queen. She flips out about everything and picks on everybody, us included," Kyoya piped in. He wanted to say more but Riko suddenly cut him off.

"No! I HAVE to worry! Because this always happens to me, and it happens on all those teenage girl movies, too! I run my mouth and then someone tells the whole school about it and everyone picks on me every single day and none of the teachers will stop it and say that it's my fault for being stupid and dumb and annoying and they'll tell their parents that I'm the one being mean to them even though they're not and-and-and-and Rina's gonna tell me it's my fault for being weird and dumb and stupid and-and-and-and-and-and-and…"

Riko went on and on like she was worrying about everything that happened in her life. Anzu, Kyoya, and Marina couldn't prevent the ungraceful droppings of their jaws as they watched Riko ramble like a worrywart. Then, unable to watch and listen to the poor girl kill herself with worry and fear, Kyoya grabbed her arm and pulled her toward him, causing her to stop rambling like she's about to suffer an anxiety attack.

"You're not stupid, weird, or dumb. Jeez, you worry more than my dad does! If any of those idiots pick on you, let us know! We'll give them some good ol' Falcon Punches! Besides, my legs might not work, but that doesn't mean I can't put up a fight!" Kyoya told her cheerfully, raising one of his little fists and swinging it around a little to empathize his point.

"But you'll get in trouble if you do that!" Riko said. But in her brain, however, it was quite different. _'What?! They actually want to stand up to them for me? Nobody ever does that except for my parents and Hikage!'_ She thought.

"Won't we get in trouble anyway? Knowing Inoue, she never let her prey catch a break for a millisecond," Marina retorted.

"Welcome to middle school," Anzu piped in. "Besides, Inoue's kind of a snob, but she's all talk and no bite, last I checked."

After that, the day went by just fine. But Riko and Anzu noticed that the girl from before, Dounowaki, continued to watch them. The girl hadn't done anything bad, but Riko hoped she wasn't like Yoshie or her friends. She and Kyoya apparently knew each other, and they're supposedly on bad terms. But that's about all they knew.

* * *

Around the time school let out, Moonbeam and Sunbeam continued their search for their two sisters. Still, they came up empty, but they kept on looking. This time, they went farther than usual. After a while, they stopped in front of a funeral home.

"Ooooh...after all this time we still haven't found Starbeam or Lovebeam. I really hope they're not...y'know," Moonbeam whimpered sadly as she tried to catch her breath. They've been searching for nine hours, and were quite exhausted.

"Don't think like that, Moonbeam! I'm sure they must have fallen a little ways from us. We can't give up. Not after we've come this far," Sunbeam told her reassuringly. However, in her own burning heart, some doubts swirled. Not wanting to lose hope, however, she tried her best to squelch those uncomfortable feelings, knowing that they'd slow her down if she allowed them to consume her. She didn't want to believe her sisters were dead. They couldn't be. "I wonder what street this is? Oh! This is Inazuma Avenue. Let's look down here once we're rested up."

"Sure," Moonbeam muttered, her long ears drooping downward. After a few minutes of catching their breath and regaining their strength, the two fairies fluttered toward Inazuma Avenue, hoping to do some more searching before they returned to Riko's house for the day. But it didn't take long for them to be distracted.

"Hm? Do you hear that, Sunbeam?"

"A harmonica? Yeah."

"It sounds nice. Want to see who's playing it?"

"Sure. I guess it wouldn't hurt."

It didn't take long for them to find the person playing the harmonica either, as it was Anzu (not that they know this), sitting on her front porch, contentedly and happily playing her precious silver hunk of metal. Moonbeam and Sunbeam hid in a nearby bush in front of another house, curious and entranced at the same time. The song Anzu is playing was much softer in tone this time around, and not as bouncy, lively, or cheery like before.

"She plays really well. Kinda like Patch," Sunbeam whispered with a smile.

"I agree. It's a lovely sound. But...in a way, it sounds rather sad," Moonbeam muttered.

"Sad? What do you mean?" Sunbeam asked, confused.

"It sounds like she's channeling a kind of sadness in her playing, like she's using the harmonica as an outlet," Moonbeam explained.

"How DO you channel feelings into what you do? I never get how that works," Sunbeam said, scratching one of her ears. "Hey! Doesn't she look a LOT like Cure Sunlight to you?"

"Cure Sunlight? You mean one of the Pretty Cures from the Queen's stories?" Moonbeam asked before turning to look at Anzu again. "Ohhh! You're right! She does! She has her human form's hair, but that girl's hair is a lot longer and straighter. Sunlight's was massively curly, like in the picture she showed us."

"I know, right?" Sunbeam said in agreement. She turned around to watch some more...only to find something light blue popping out from one of the bushes.

It took her a while to see what it was that popped out, but it soon became clear. It was a creature like her and Moonbeam, but with small, ball-like ears with pale yellow tips, green eyes just like Riko and Kyoya, a yellow, five-pointed star on her back, a pale green ribbon wrapped around her neck with a yellow star on the front, and a blue and yellow striped tail with a yellow star on the back.

It hit Sunbeam and Moonbeam right then and there.

"STARBEEEEAM!" They both shouted so loud they literally caused Anzu such fright that she stopped playing her harmonica.

Not aware of this fact, the fairies very enthusiastically and happily flew right over to the blue and yellow fairy, glomping her with the force of a freight train. Starbeam fell on the grass. Anzu ran back inside her house, not wanting to stay outside any longer. The fairies were oblivious to this. At first, Starbeam was quite shocked by the appearance of these fairies, but once she calmed down and comprehended their appearance, she began to tear up.

"Moonbeam! Sunbeam! Oh, how I missed you so!" Starbeam cried happily when she got up and embraced her two sisters. What a joyous occasion this turned out to be.

"We were so worried about you, Star! We thought something bad might have happened to you!" Sunbeam exclaimed once she calmed down and let go of her younger sister.

"We're so glad you're okay! I was beginning to doubt if we could ever find you!" Moonbeam said as she wiped away some tears with her stubby little hands. "You must have been scared."

"Oh, indeed I was, my dear sisters! My fright consumed me like no other. But I have wandered and meandered all this time, hoping I'd seek you out. I'm so jubilant to finally be reunited with you two," Starbeam told them. She felt as though a burden was lifted off of her tiny little blue shoulders.

But Moonbeam noticed something else that was unsettling. "Where's Lovebeam? Wasn't she with you?"

Starbeam sadly looked down at the grass she stood upon. "I'm afraid I don't know where she is. She wasn't with me when I woke up. I'm sorry," Starbeam confessed sadly.

Moonbeam put a paw on her shoulder reassuringly. "It's okay. We figured something like this would happen."

"We'll find her! Don't you worry, Star! We never gave up looking for you, so we'll keep on looking until we're all back together again!" Sunbeam edicted proudly, which made Starbeam crack a smile.

"You're as cheerful as ever, Sunbeam, especially considering what happened. Oh! By the way, what did happen while I was away? I noticed one of the Heart Lighters flew away from me some time yesterday," Starbeam said.

"Oh! You don't know! You'll never believe it, Star!" Sunbeam exclaimed happily as she decided to tell Starbeam about everything that happened since they fell to Earth.

After running inside frightfully, Anzu collected herself and looked out one of her front windows curiously. She could see the fluffy looking fairies conversing amongst themselves happily, but her lime green eyes were still rather wide with surprise.

"What the heck are those things? There's no way they can be real. But I can't be dreaming either," Anzu mused to herself curiously as she watched the fairies talk amongst themselves. But within her heart, curiosity and interest began to blossom in her heart. She cracked a smile as she watched Sunbeam proceed to tell Starbeam everything that happened. "I have to admit, they sure are cute and cuddly-looking."

* * *

About a few streets up, Zenjin, in his usual tacky black and red raiment, quietly ambled on the sidewalk, looking at the beautiful scenery around him. The flowering trees and their excessive cotton candy-like, pinky white blooms, the piles and piles of petals he was seeing everywhere, the lovely twittering of the songbirds, the chitter-chatter of the squirrels as they crawled up their favorite trees. To the regular person, all of this natural beauty would be considered quite beautiful, calming, soothing, and delightful. But to Zenjin, it was just disgusting. Why, just being among this natural scenery made him want to puke.

"Ugh. Am I ever going to find any place that DOESN'T look like that trashy saccharine land? Jeez! Turn down the pink, why don't you?!" Zenjin yelped irritably as he shot a purple ray of light at one cherry tree, stripping it bare of every single one of its beautiful blossoms, making it look very gnarled and withered like it hadn't been watered since the beginning of time.

"This is all so useless and stupid. Flowers? Pink? Animals? Blech! Gag me. I'd like to use my awesome powers to strip this and all other worlds of everything good. But I can't bite off more than I can chew, now can I? Plus I have to keep my priorities straight," Zenjin mused to himself like it was the most normal thing in the world.

He stopped on one sidewalk and looked up at the pristine blue sky. He was disgusted by how excessively blue it was, without anything in it. He wished it'd be cloudy or rainy. "It...it sure has been a long time since I've been on Earth. It's hard to believe all of this stuff was even here," He chuckled a bit. "Then again, I did spend 90% of my life in only two places on this enormous and stupid planet, so of course I wouldn't know all of this was here. But where in the wild blue yonder do I start looking?"

He put a hand on his chin and began ruminating to himself quietly, unaware that a cat just passed right by him. _'I can't seem to remember the name of my hometown or my old home address. I wish I wrote them down. But then again, I can barely read or write anyway. But one thing's for sure: this place definitely isn't it. It had less trees, and the school here is nothing like the school I went to. It was more fancy and posh. Ugh. I hate fancy and posh unless it stuff I like,'_ Zenjin thought to himself. He wanted to think some more until something yanked him out of his reverie, which he did not take kindly to. It didn't take too long for him to find the source of the sound. It came from a pale brown house. One of the windows was open, and the sound of yelling echoed in the air.

"Why won't you sign these divorce papers?! It's been three years!" The shrill voice of a woman shouted angrily.

"You're just trying to leech out some alimony money!" A hoarse man's voice snapped back with just as much hate.

"_You're_ the money grubber! Instead of paying bills and food and mortgage, you spend it on booze and casinos and cocaine! You wonder why our daughter hates us! When are you ever going to shape up?!"

"You're the one who needs to shape up and know your place, you old bat! Both you and the brat!"

"STOP IT!" Another voice yelled, stopping the man and woman from yelling any further. Curious, Zenjin walked closer to the window that's at least a meter higher he is by a longshot.

Although the shrill yelling irritated him, he couldn't help but be interested in the outcome of this brouhaha. "This is exactly why I don't like coming home anymore! All you two ever do is fight and scream and hack at each other's throats! This is all you do every single day! I can't stand it anymore! Why can't you two just drop dead?!"

Then, a resounding slap noise pierced the tense atmosphere, both inside and out. "If you hate being here that much, why don'cha just leave already, you spoiled brat?! Why do you think we haven't gotten divorced yet?! Don't think you're so special just 'cause you got it easier than we do! You're not the only one who's suffering around here, so be a good girl and get over it!"

"You're such an idiot, you know that, Kenta?!" The woman yelled, appalled. "Why are you blaming her for all of this?! Don't drag her into our mess! Nanako! Wait!"

All of a sudden, Nanako ran out of the house in tears. Because Zenjin was just a few feet away from her, they didn't bump into each other. But he did see her run away. _'Hmm...I wonder if she knows anything?'_ Zenjin thought as he decided to fly after her.

Nanako ran and ran as fast as she could, like a cheetah. But she didn't get to run for every long. All of a sudden, one of her feet slipped, and she fell on the concrete street, flat on her face. She tearfully pulled herself up and found many messy red scratches on her palms. She found that there was a big hole in her jeans, revealing a small gash on her knee, probably from falling on the concrete.

But she didn't care about any of these. She just wanted to get away. From everything. The yelling, the screaming, the confusion, the discord, the pointless blame being heaped on her, the alcohol, the financial difficulties, everything. She couldn't repress her emotions any longer. She erupted into passionate crying, not caring whether anyone watched or not. Being stared at was better than getting yelled at for stuff that wasn't her fault, so why not? After a while, her passionate sobbing died down somewhat, but she still didn't stop.

"Why can't something good ever happen to me for once?! Why can't...Mom and Dad...just split up already?" Nanako yelled into the heavens, but her voice became hoarse from too much crying. But she was completely oblivious to the fact that she wasn't alone.

"You're so stupid to think you've got it bad."

"Huh? Who are you?" She wished she hadn't turned around right then and there.

* * *

"What?! You found two Pretty Cure?!" Starbeam exclaimed, surprised by everything her two sisters told her just now.

"Yeah! Isn't it awesome?!" Sunbeam exclaimed happily like she was a happy sports fan.

Moonbeam was about to say something until her ears suddenly twitched violently.

"What's wrong?" Starbeam asked as she watched Moonbeam's face grow pale with worry.

"It's Zenjin! He's struck again! I heard a scream just now!" Moonbeam exclaimed with a worried look on her pale purple face.

"Where?!" Sunbeam yelped.

"A few streets up! I'll go get Riko and Hotaru!" Moonbeam exclaimed as she flew off to find Riko and Hotaru.

"Let's go stop him this time!" Sunbeam yelped as she fluttered away.

"Wait! Sunbeam! He's too strong! Please don't be reckless!" Starbeam shouted as she gave chase to her fired up little sister, who honestly wanted nothing more than to kick Zenjin's sorry butt and give him what he deserved for what he did to Rozaniela and everyone on it.

Sunbeam and Starbeam flew over some trees toward the place where Moonbeam heard the scream as fast as they could. Sunbeam couldn't wait to deal with Zenjin, but Starbeam looked a lot more reluctant. When they got there, they hid in some bushes so they wouldn't be spotted. But what they saw appalled Starbeam.

Nanako was strapped to a big red wall screaming for her life. Zenjin was peering shamelessly into her Soul Portal like it was the most normal thing in the world.

"That's a Soul Portal, isn't it?" Starbeam whispered frightfully. "I thought those were only myths!"

"They're not," Sunbeam told her in a low but angry whisper.

"Why's he looking into it? Can't he see the girl's screaming?" Starbeam asked.

"I dunno. But he couldn't care less about who he hurts or whether he's invading their privacy or not," Sunbeam mused angrily.

Nanako continued to struggle and scream for her life. "Get off me!" After a short while, Zenjin pulled his head out from the Soul Portal. But he looked quite angry and stared down at the helpless girl like he saw the most disgusting thing ever.

"You're so pathetic, whining about your parents fighting every day and making your suffering worse than it already is. Your flimsy pain is nothing compared to mine! It's time I show you that my suffering is far greater than yours will ever be, you slime!" Zenjin said at first, then yelled loudly as he thrust his hand into the Soul Portal, causing Nanako to scream and flail and cry louder than before. Starbeam's paws flew to her mouth to keep herself from screaming.

"How can he be so cruel?!" Starbeam said through her paws muffling her mouth.

Sunbeam knew exactly what she felt. But this time, she didn't attack him like the other times. _'I wonder what he does to their souls when he rips them out?'_ Sunbeam thought, refraining from stopping him, even though in her heart she really wanted to give him an epic beatdown. Zenjin pulled out a clear brown orb, which, as soon as it touched his hand, began to very gradually turn black.

Once it was completely black, Zenjin raised the orb into the sky. "Come forth, Human Trash!" The orb glowed in an eerie black light and began to grow in size.

Finally, Moonbeam, Cure Twilight, and Cure Starlight arrived on the scene as soon as the light dissipated. The black light morphed into a gigantic horse, black as the night. Zenjin turned around to find Cures Twilight and Starlight looking at him with austere, angry looks.

"Ha! You're just in time! Do you like my creations? I call them Human Trash, because that's what they are inside and out! I have business I need to take care of, so feel free to get your insides crushed by its hooves," Zenjin gloated shamelessly and then tried to fly away.

'_Human Trash? Really?'_ Riko thought, appalled by his name for his _"creations."_

"Starlight Shower!"

"Twilight Serenade!"

Both Pretty Cures shot their attacks at Zenjin, but he knocked them all out and managed to get away, leaving behind a giant, pitch black horse whinnying and wreaking havoc. Quickly, Cure Twilight grabbed Nanako's body and moved her somewhere safe with Moonbeam's help while Cure Starlight immediately took action. With a majestic leap, she jumped onto the horse's back and pulled on its hair, causing it to whinny loudly and romp around, knocking over some trees and causing them to fall onto the street. Thankfully for her, none of the trees hit any houses due to their small size.

"Starlight Kick!" Cure Starlight kicked the angry midnight black horse in the neck with a swirl of her leg, but all it did was make the equine even more angry. With another romp, it managed to throw Cure Starlight quite a long distance. In fact, Starlight fell in the exact same place where the fairies heard the screams.

"Starlight!" Cure Twilight cried out fearfully.

"That big horse sure is strong!" Starbeam cried, in awe of the enormous black mare's strength.

Cure Starlight fell on the front porch of a house. Before she could regain her composure, someone came out from the house to observe the scene and kneel down to her level. "Whoa! Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I…" Cure Starlight finally managed to sit up and was about to thank Cure Twilight for coming to her aid...only it wasn't Cure Twilight who asked if she was okay. It was a girl with a long, blonde ponytail, glasses, and dressed in black clothes. They could hear loud screams echoing from all over the place. People began to evacuate and run for their lives.

"Twilight!" Cure Starlight exclaimed as she got up and tried to leap back to the scene.

"Wait! Don't!" Anzu tried to get her to stay, but Cure Starlight was already too far away for her to reach. Horse whinnies echoed in the air.

"Cat Slash!" Cure Twilight managed leap in the air to slash the horse's face with her claws once she jumped to its long face. It whinnied loudly, causing the purple clad girl to cover her ears and fall into a pile of bushes rather ungracefully. Some of the thistles even dug into her skin. "Meooowch!" She yelped, feeling the sharp thistles pierce her fresh skin like little tiny knives and needles.

"Come on, girls! They need our help!" Sunbeam exclaimed. Moonbeam and Starbeam nodded.

The horse tried to gallop away, but the fairies floated over to the rampaging animal and positioned themselves in a circle around it. The clips on their ribbons all glowed in a radiant sunny yellow light. A sparkling yellow barrier surrounded the horse's head, all the way down to its neck. Unfortunately, it only covered its head and neck, not its entire body.

"Without Lovebeam, we can't make our barrier bigger!" Starbeam exclaimed frightfully. The horse whinnied again, shaking its head violently, managing to break the barrier and send the fairies flying.

"I got'cha!" Quickly, Cure Twilight managed to catch all three fairies and set them down next to the unconscious Nanako. Twilight and Starlight then nodded to each other and proceeded to try and beat the monster down with flurries of punches, kicks, and slashes from their weapons, Starlight's naginata and Twilight's pseudo-cat claws. Cure Twilight decided it'd be best to scratch its legs so they'd be too injured to run and carry the horse's weight, hopefully sparing many houses the fate of getting destroyed. She did try to be careful so that the horse's hooves didn't hit her.

Cure Starlight, unable to keep herself steady on the horse's back, decided she didn't need her naginata anymore and put it away so she could land some serious punches on the horse's face and back. But neither was enough to immobilize the horse. Cure Twilight did manage to punch the horse in the stomach with both fists, but all it did was make it whinny loudly, causing her to retreat to the ground and cover her ears in fright.

Unfortunately for the both of them, nothing they did could stop the horse from running up the street quite a good distance despite their best efforts. Cure Starlight then decided to pull on its mane, causing it to whinny loudly once again, only this time, it galloped and flailed around to try and throw her off.

"Twilight Serenade!" Cure Twilight shot another beam of light at it, but the horse galloped like a raging bull in a rodeo contest, flailing in all directions, managing to evade the attack. Now Cure Twilight was getting impatient. "Arrrrrgh! Why can't we control this thing?!" She held out her Twilight Ring. "I wanna try something!" She exclaimed as she held the ring in her hand and closed her eyes. On cue, her gigantic ring began glowing in a radiant purple light. She opened her eyes.

"Twilight Sparkle!" Cure Twilight threw the glowing ring at the horse like it was a frisbee. Unfortunately for her, the horse flailed around again, managing to successfully evade the glowing ring. It returned to Cure Twilight's hand like a boomerang.

"Awww! Nothing we do is working!" Cure Twilight complained.

Cure Starlight wasn't faring much better. Because the horse is galloping violently, trying its hardest to throw her off like a bull in a rodeo show, Starlight began to become a little green in the face, though she tried desperately to keep her composure. But then she caught sight of Nanako's unconscious body lying by the tree.

Then it hit her. "Shiga-san?!"

"Wait, who is this?" Cure Twilight asked as she tried to punch the horse's side, but wound up falling into a tree like a rag doll. She did manage to leap safely back to the ground on her winged shoes. The little wings on her shoes flapped a little so as to break her fall, which they did successfully.

"That's Shiga Nanako! She's in my homeroom! This horse is her corrupted soul!" Cure Starlight exclaimed.

"_All my parents do is fight!"_ The horse whinnied in a grim, but hauntingly high-pitched voice. Finally, it managed to throw off Cure Starlight, but she regained her composure and gracefully landed feet first onto the concrete, the wings on both her ocean blue shoes flapping as she descended, breaking her fall. _"All they do is yell and scream and hate each other! Why can't things be back to the way they were before?! We don't even do anything together anymore! I'm sick of it!"_ The horse whinnied again as it knocked over a big tree with its hooves, flattening a mailbox to the point where it was flat as a pancake.

'_Could that be why she's so sad?'_ Cure Starlight thought. Upon further reminiscing, Nanako was never seen without a frown on her face. She just drudged through each day looking so sad that one would think someone in her family died. It'd be one thing if she was sad for just one day, but Nanako was known for being sad and grim practically every single day.

Cures Starlight and Twilight finally decided to do a double front kick on the horse, causing it to fall on its left side, crashing down onto the concrete, making quite an enormous dent in the street the size of a queen size bed. However, the horse didn't stay down for long. Soon, it got right back up, whinnied, and galloped right after the two girls.

"Yeeeeeek!" Cure Twilight screamed like she saw a horror movie and ran as fast as she could from the gigantic, black, rampaging horse, with Cure Starlight running alongside her.

"How can that horse be so strong?!" Cure Starlight yelled irritably, perturbed by the fact that the two of them together just can't keep it down for more than ten seconds, which wasn't enough time for them to charge up their attacks and purify Nanako's soul.

"I can't fight it anymore! I'm scaaaared! Meeeeooooow!" Cure Twilight wailed in a piercing screech. All she wanted to do now was go home. She didn't want to get stomped on by a horse's hooves. She knew horse hooves can be extremely fatal if they hit a person in certain vital areas.

"Whaddo we do now?" Moonbeam exclaimed as she, Sunbeam and Starbeam stopped to catch their breath after getting knocked out before. All of a sudden, a piercing scream came out of Starbeam's mouth. "What's wrong now?!" Moonbeam yelped, sounding very exasperated. Understandable, since it's not everyday a giant black mare is wreaking havoc in a suburb.

"The blonde harmonica girl!" Starbeam screamed fearfully. It took one look for Moonbeam and Sunbeam to realize what she meant and gasp with unadulterated horror.

Anzu was running toward the rampaging equine! With a calm look on her face!

"We gotta stop her!" Sunbeam shouted as she, Moonbeam, and Starbeam fluttered toward the rampaging black mare despite it outrunning them.

The Pretty Cures only managed to run for about three blocks. Exhausted from too much running, Cure Twilight fell to her knees in front of some untouched trees that led to the nearby woods. "I...can't...run...any...more...too...tired…" Twilight croaked out only one word between pants, she was that exhausted and tired.

"But the horse is gaining on us! We'll get trampled!" Cure Starlight exclaimed fearfully, knowing they're sitting ducks that'll turn into a horse's race track if they stay. But truth be told, Starlight was exhausted as well.

The mare stopped in front of the two girls and raised its front hooves, ready to stomp on them. The fairies couldn't gain any more speed, and even they were getting tired from too much flying, especially since Moonbeam and Sunbeam spent the entire day looking for Starbeam before this.

Cure Twilight squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to see the tragic outcome. But instead of seeing, she and Starlight ended up hearing. Hearing a sound they never expected to hear in a situation like this.

A harmonica.

Twilight slowly opened her eyes to a very strange sight. The horse was standing in a normal position, with all of its hooves planted firmly onto the concrete, not raised like before. Instead of looking pained, now it was content, its long face and neck softly swaying back and forth, left and right, like it was swinging to the rhythm of the harmonica music and enjoying it peacefully. Its eyes were both closed. It was no longer complaining, whinnying, or crying.

Anzu stood firmly next to the horse, calmly playing her harmonica like it was the most normal thing in the world. The song is different from the Johnny Cash song she played this morning. This one was much softer, more mellow, more soothing, something that would definitely be calming to someone who's had a rough day.

"An-chan?! What the-?!" Cure Twilight exclaimed, completely flabbergasted by her appearance, her emerald eyes wide with shock and awe.

"You know her?" Starlight asked curiously.

"Yeah! She's one of my friends from school! The horse...likes the music!"

Even the fairies couldn't help but be amazed by how just the sound of a little thing like a silver harmonica could calm a gigantic black horse that was knocking down trees, destroying houses, and making huge dents in the street just seconds before. Soon, the harmonica music ceased. Anzu pulled it from her mouth, and looked at the horse with courage blazing in her pale green, lime-like eyes, standing firm as a statue, unwilling to just simply run away like a coward.

"Hey you! Giant black horse! I heard you whining earlier!" Anzu exclaimed in a bold, almost husky voice. "I know what it's like to have parents that hate each other! I puke three times a month, and I have been for the past three years because of it! I'll bet you're sick of it all too, but that doesn't make it right for you to take your anger out on everybody when they didn't even do anything to you! And you can't escape it by dying either! You have to live your life the way you wish!"

The horse turned around, now aware of Anzu's presence. It's pointed ears stood up, the pointed edges pointing to the sky and twitching a little. To the trained equestrian eye, this

means that it heard at she was saying._ "All I want is for all the yelling and screaming to stop!"_

"Believe me, I want the fights between my parents to stop, too! But this won't make the pain go away! It'll only make it worse!" Anzu exclaimed, unfazed.

'_People can puke if their parents fight a lot? That can happen?'_ Riko thought curiously, her curiosity-filled head canted to the left side a little bit in confusion.

Unfortunately for Anzu, Nanako's corrupted soul didn't listen, as it decided to gallop toward her and try to trample her with her hooves. Anzu quickly jumped out of the way and rolled onto the concrete, her long, beautiful blonde hair getting some gravel stuck in it.

"Ah! Sunbeam! Your ribbon!" Starbeam exclaimed with surprise consuming her high voice.

"Huh?!" Sunbeam shouted as she looked down. The sun shaped clip on her crimson red ribbon was glowing in a yellow light. The light came out of Sunbeam's ribbon and dissipated to reveal a yellow Heart Lighter with a gold, sun-shaped cap on it, which had a little light glowing inside of it as well.

On impulse, Sunbeam twisted the sun-shaped cap and removed it from the star shaped perfume bottle, allowing the yellow light to fly out of it and float towards a very confused Anzu, who managed to stand back up. As it flew in front of her, it flashed brighter than before, causing one of Anzu's arms to fly into her face.

"Ugh! What the heck is this?!" Anzu yelped.

"An-chan! Grab the light!" Cure Twilight yelled as loud as she could.

"Why?!"

"Just do it! Hurry!" The horse knocked down another tree not too far away.

Not wanting to argue, Anzu grabbed the light. As soon as it was trapped in her palm, the light dissipated, allowing Anzu to open her eyes and discover that it turned into a golden yellow jewel in the shape of a heart, with a little sun-like pattern right in the middle. The yellow Heart Lighter itself glowed for a second, then stopped, revealing a hollow, heart shaped cavity. Sunbeam, knowing what this meant, took the Heart Lighter and flew over to a confused Anzu.

"What's going on?!" Anzu asked.

"The Heart Lighter has resonated with you! That means you're a Pretty Cure, a legendary warrior who can purify Shiga-san's corrupted soul! Now hurry! Take the Heart Lighter, put the jewel in the cavity and say, _'Pretty Cure, let the light shine!'_ and it'll do the rest!" Sunbeam explained with a bright, sunny smile on her face.

Anzu wasn't quite sure what was going on, what this strange creature was, and why it was asking her to do something she'd never done before. But considering the strange and unprecedented circumstances going on right now, she figured she might as well do it and see what happens. Despite being fearful and hesitant, she put the yellow, heart shaped jewel into the hollow area, and howled when the light ate her from the toes up.

"Pretty Cure, let the light shine!" She shouted as she held the Heart Lighter in the air. The heart object dissolved into the perfume bottle, not only filling in the gap, but filling the bottle with a kind of translucent, golden yellow liquid.

Anzu spun around in circles and sprayed it all over herself. As soon as the perfume made contact with her normal clothes, they changed completely! Instead of her usual black attire and Sweeney Todd themed hoodie, she found herself donning a sleeveless pale yellow and white shirt with little yellow suns going down the chest part, along with some lacy white frills on each side of them, along with a pair of darker yellow shorts. A large, dark yellow ribbon appeared on her shirt with a shiny lighter yellow sun decoration on it. On both of her arms were armbands with white lace frills circling them, both with one solitary yellow sun on each. A small, pale yellow, blanket-like cloth with darker yellow pockets on each side wrapped around her waist, with the ends connected to the front by a yellow sun-shaped, belt-like decoration. She was wearing snow white, thigh high socks that go a little bit below her shorts, little yellow shoes with darker yellow suns on them that looked like slip on ballet shoes, and little pairs of white wings on each of them. She now had a large, white hair ribbon supporting her long ponytail whose ends look very much like pointed rabbit ears. Her hair itself darkened slightly, making it look more gold, like regular gold. Fingerless, dark yellow gloves appeared on both of her hands, but they went up to her forearms. A little dark yellow sun like jewel appeared just above her collarbone. The Heart Lighter dangled from her shorts like a little keychain. Soon, the light surrounding her dissipated, bringing her back to Earth.

She descended before the black mare, who backed away and whinnied as soon as she made her shiny entrance. Now she looked quite radiant, like the yellow sun shining brightly in the sky. "I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

"Aww. I thought she was gonna be something like Cure Sunlight," Cure Twilight mused.

"I don't believe it…" Cure Starlight whispered to herself, awestruck by Anzu's radiant and stunning transformation and the revelation that just smacked them across their faces.

"She's a Pretty Cure now!" Starbeam exclaimed joyfully.

Soon, Anzu, now Cure Dawn, suddenly looked down at her new raiment, looking quite flummoxed as to how the heck she managed to change clothes and now suddenly look like she came out of an idol concert. "Whoa…" She mused curiously to herself. "This can't be real. Am I dreaming or something? What's with the magical girl get-up?" She asked herself, confused.

Cure Twilight's ears suddenly picked up on the sound of hooves clopping. "An-chan! Look out!" She shouted.

Seeing that the horse is galloping toward her without a second thought, Cure Dawn leaped out of the black mare's path, right into the air like she's flying. She hopped onto the roof of one house and rummaged through the pockets on the shawl around her waist.

"Is there some kind of weapon I can use or something?" She asked as she rummaged through her pockets. Finally, she pulled out a small set of shiny, golden yellow nunchucks with sun-like patterns carved into them, which instantly grew bigger as soon as she pulled them out.

"I don't know what the heck is going on, but...I might as well join the party!" Cure Dawn said as she got her nunchucks out, readied them, and made a majestic leap from the house's roof toward the confused black mare. As soon as she got close to the horse's long face, she slammed both sides of her nunchucks on it, causing it to lose its balance and become unsteady. It didn't fall down right off. After that, Cure Dawn's nunchucks began to glow in a radiant yellow color, suddenly spouting blazing golden flames that danced wildly.

"Dawn Flame!" Spinning around like a ballerina, the dancing yellow flame floated in the air, and she smacked it with her nunchucks like a baseball bat hitting a home run, sending the flame flying toward the black mare and consuming it, causing it to whinny loudly.

"Don't hurt it too much! That horse is actually a person's corrupted soul! You have to purify it so it can be back to normal!" Cure Twilight cried out as loud as she could despite the horse's whinnying being quite vociferous.

"Thanks for the info!" Cure Dawn replied with a thumbs up, grateful for Cure Twilight's warning.

Without meaning to, she held her nunchucks into the air. "Lend me your strength, holy light!" She shouted in a booming voice. _'Okay...why am I saying this weird stuff? Holy light? What?'_ She thought as her nunchucks glowed in a warm, golden yellow light. She made some elegant movements with her nunchucks like a ninja and gripped both ends with her hands. "Dawn Nunchucks, Power Up!"

She pointed her glowing nunchucks at the horse. "You needn't suffer anymore. The corrupting darkness will be banished, and the light in your heart will shine again!" Her nunchucks made a small, glowing, yellow ball of light appear in front of her like a little sun, which floated toward the horse. "Dawn Burst!"

As soon as the light made contact with the whinnying black mare, it exploded like a star reaching the end of its days, literally making the black mare's skin peel right off. Soon, the helpless black mare fell to pieces completely, and then its pieces disappeared into thin air like the horse never existed. Once the glowing yellow light faded, Nanako's pale brown orb appeared on the ground, intact, and without the tiniest crack on its hard surface. Confused, Cure Dawn slowly picked it up.

"Wow! You were amazing out there, An-chan, and it was your very first try!" Cure Twilight exclaimed as she glomped Cure Dawn and squeezed her while laughing happily, making the blonde girl even more confused.

"Uhhh…" Cure Dawn muttered, still having a bit of a hard time comprehending what she just did and everything else that just happened, until Cure Starlight ambled over to them.

"Twilight. You might want to get off of her. She's probably confused out of her mind," Starlight told her calmly.

"Ack! Sorry!" Twilight removed herself from the confused newcomer. "Oh! That crystal ball you're holding is that girl's soul," She explained as she pointed to the unconscious Nanako, whose Soul Portal was still bare and exposed. "You gotta put it back in. But you have to be REALLY careful, because if it breaks, she'll die."

"Ohhh! I get it now. Better get to it," Cure Dawn said as she ambled over to the unconscious Nanako, kneeled down, and very slowly dropped her soul into her Soul Portal. Once it fell right in, the Soul Portal disappeared, and the color returned to Nanako's face. The girls and fairies decided to leave so Nanako wouldn't notice them. They hid behind some untouched trees.

"Thanks a lot for helping us out. That horse was a bit...too strong for us," Cure Twilight told her.

"Don't mention it, Riko," Cure Dawn replied rather casually.

"Wait, what?!" Riko's eyes were wide with bewilderment. "You can tell it's me?!"

"Yeah. Your voice gives it away," Cure Dawn said. "Plus you called me An-chan earlier."

"Ohhh. I see. Oh!" Riko replied, then decided to introduce everyone to her. "This is Minamigawa Hotaru, my brother's friend. She's a Pretty Cure, too! And these are the fairies Sunbeam and Moonbeam."

"Don't forget Starbeam here!" Moonbeam exclaimed as she pointed to Starbeam.

"I'm sorry I didn't introduce myself earlier. It's a pleasure to be acquainted with you all, and I'm very much looking forward to working with you in the future," Starbeam told them very politely and bowed before them quite formally. Hotaru couldn't help but laugh.

"There's no need to be so formal, little one," Hotaru told the pale blue fairy with a chuckle.

"Yeah. We're sorry all this craziness had to happen," Riko said.

"Yeah, it is kinda crazy, but it's alright. So these little guys are fairies, huh?" Anzu said as the fairies floated up to her.

"Yep! We're fairies!" Sunbeam exclaimed. Anzu gently scooped Sunbeam in her hands and began nudging her cheek against hers.

"You're so cuuuute! And so soft and warm!" Anzu crooned sweetly, rubbing herself against a giggly Sunbeam.

"Hey! That tickles!" Sunbeam exclaimed. Riko, Hotaru, Moonbeam, and Starbeam laughed in response to this for a bit.

"Starbeam?" Hotaru asked.

"Eh?"

"If you want, you're more than welcome to stay at my house."

"Really? But is that alright, though? Won't I be a burden?"

"Not at all," Hotaru replied with a sweet smile. "I'd love to have a cute, fluffy animal friend keep me company. Plus, you look like you need some well-needed rest."

"It is true. I am truly grateful for your magnanimous generosity, and I promise to not be a burden or expose myself so as to draw unwanted attention," Starbeam told her very formally.

"Does...she always talk with big words?" Riko asked, a little cowed by Starbeam's verbose, erudite vocabulary and formal way of speaking.

"Yep," Moonbeam and Sunbeam replied in perfect unison.

"Isn't this cool though, An-chan? We're superheroes now, and we can fight crime together! We can save the world from a great evil and preserve justice! Won't that be awesome?!" Riko exclaimed happily, like she's about to burst into a paroxysm of joy.

"I'm kinda...still having a hard time believing all of this. But I'd love to fight by your side, since we're already friends and all," Anzu replied sheepishly, a little bit embarrassed by everything that's happened. Riko was oblivious to this, however, and proceeded to embrace Anzu in a tight squeeze again.

"Yay! Yay yay yay! We're partners! This is gonna be sooo cool! We're gonna fight crime and stuff! But you're probably a way better fighter than I am," Riko rambled as she squeezed Anzu like she was a pillow. The fairies and Hotaru couldn't help but laugh, happy that everything's back to normal for now. "Oh! One other thing...Zenjin called the corrupted souls Human Trash," Riko suddenly said as she stopped cheering.

"I know. He said that. That sounds pretty degrading and offensive, don't you think?" Hotaru asked with her arms crossed.

"I agree. Oh! How about something like...the Corrupt Sentinels?" Anzu piped in.

"Ohhh! I like that much better! It sounds cooler!" Riko exclaimed.

"I like it too. Let's call them Corrupt Sentinels from now on," Hotaru said. Soon, they transformed back to normal and went back home, hopefully to return to their normal day.

But this was only the beginning.

* * *

**Author's Note: Chapter 5 will take a while to get redone. I'm gonna cut out the entire "ostracized officer" subplot in favor of more screen time and development for Marina. School's still getting in my way, so I have to keep my priorities straight.**


	5. Cure Dusk, Flame On!

Chapter 5: Let the Flames of Compassion Burn! Cure Dusk, Blaze!

On one Thursday, Marina stood in the middle of what appeared to be a classroom, only she wasn't in school. She was in another building away from the school. She stood in the middle of the room, facing a boy a little older than she, with a young woman watching from a corner. A circle of chairs surrounded them, all occupied by kids of varying middle school ages.

"What? You too chicken to face me?! Huh?" The boy taunted.

Marina inhaled through her nose and exhaled through her mouth. She kept a calm look on her face. "No. I won't fight you," With that, Marina returned to her chair.

The woman clapped wholeheartedly. "Very good! If someone confronts you and deliberately tries to push your buttons, all you have to do is keep calm and walk away. Keep calm and carry on, I always say. That's it for today," The woman told them enthusiastically.

The kids got their stuff and left the building. Marina picked up her bag and was about to leave until the woman gently tapped her on the shoulder. "What is it, Watase-sensei?" Marina asked.

"I just want to let you know...you handled yourself a lot better in that kind of situation than you did when you first came. You've gotten a lot better, Mari," Mrs. Watase told her kindly.

Marina looked away sheepishly. "Uh...sure. Thanks."

"I can tell you don't think so, but you have. A little always goes a long way, Mari. Have a little more confidence in yourself. I know you can do it."

Marina smiled before waving and leaving. At least someone believed in her, even if it wasn't someone her own age.

She turned some corners and watched as some kids around the neighborhood stuck around to talk to their friends. Marina kept going. She wished she had someone she could gossip with. But who would want to gossip with a bully? Marina knew nobody would.

Something glimmered in the sun, catching Marina's eyes. She looked down and saw a pretty silver ring made to look like a fish. She squatted down to pick it up. It certainly looked fancy, like the rings she and her mother would see whenever they would go to the mall. She put it in her pocket and walked away.

"Ugh...where is it?!" A girl's voice caught Marina's attention once she turned the next corner. Marina stopped to see a girl slightly older than she, on the sidewalk, looking around on the grass.

The girl had straight, flouncy black hair and blue green eyes. She was wearing a heavy green jacket, a long brown skirt, gray socks, white and purple sneakers, and a yellow scarf around her neck. Marina watched the girl pace around on all fours, with a very worried look on her face. She looked as though she was going to cry.

Marina clutched the ring in her pocket. She had to start somewhere. Why not now? "Is something wrong?"

The girl kept looking around anxiously. "I lost my precious ring!"

Ring? "What does it look like?"

"A fish!"

So the ring belonged to her. Marina pulled the ring out. "Is this it by any chance?"

The nervous looking girl turned around. As soon as she saw the ring, her whole face lit up like a newly installed light bulb. "My ring!" She swiped the ring from Marina's hand so fast she frightened the orange haired girl a bit. "It's safe and sound! Where did you find it?!" The girl's smile was as bright as a sun.

"I found it by the street light over there-OOF!" Marina pointed to the streetlight before the girl glomped her faster than she could dodge.

"Thank you thank you THANK YOU!" The girl squealed happily, trapping Marina in a tight hug. But as confused as she was, Marina was happy that she found the girl's ring and gave it back to her. It was the right thing to do, after all.

"You're welcome..."

"Oh! Am I hugging you too hard?! I'm sorry!" The girl let go of Marina, realizing that she went a little overboard.

"It's okay. I'm just glad I found your ring," Marina waved her hand back and forth modestly.

"Me too! It's the only thing I have to remember my parents by. Oh! Do you go to Hikaribashi Middle School by any chance?"

"Yeah, I do."

"I knew I recognized you! I see you on the blacktop during recess! What grade are you?"

"Seventh."

"I'm in 8th grade!" The girl's eyes sparkled like a sun being reflected on the ocean. Marina smiled. In a way, the girl reminded her of Riko somewhat.

Riko...

"Hey!" All of a sudden, two girls dashed right in between Marina and the girl. One of them had curly blonde hair that cascaded down to her shoulders, the other one with spiky red hair and square shaped glasses. Both of them glared at Marina scornfully. "Stop bullying Umi-chan!"

"She wasn't-" Umi tried to tell them otherwise, but the spiky haired girl grabbed Umi's hand and took off. "Ouch! Hey!" The blonde girl followed her.

Marina was all alone. But the girls didn't go too far. She could still hear their voices. "What did you do that for? That was really rude," Umi told them from the other side of a nearby house.

"You don't know, do you? That girl over there? She's Asagi Marina. She's the daughter of the bad man who made my mom's friend's family poor as dirt!"

"Yeah! And she's a bully, too! She's always picking on other kids for no reason! She's bad! You're better off staying away from her."

"Glad we got to you when we did. Was she calling your names? Threatening you? Spill the beans! We'll make sure we teach her a lesson!"

"No. She found my ring and gave it back to me. See?" Umi told them in a calm, matter of fact way.

"She musta stolen it."

"I doubt it," Umi said. "But I don't think she's bad. She found my ring. If she really is bad like you say, she would have kept it for herself."

"Just stay away from her. She'll just ruin your life."

Marina balled her fist. She didn't dare let her anger get the better of her. But still, it really hurt to hear them say those things about her, even after their friend clarified the situation. At least she gave the ring back. To Marina, that was all that mattered.

* * *

"Dad? Where's Hikage? Shouldn't he be home by now?" Riko asked as she was working on some thankfully easy homework in the dining room. Rina was happily and contentedly playing with Yumiko, their pet miniature Australian shepherd.

"Yeah. Where is he anyway?" Rina asked. Little Yumiko began crawling into her lap quite happily, wiggling around like a little worm.

"He has something to do after school, so he'll be coming home a little late," Arinao replied as he signed some more checks across from Riko. "Do you need any help? I'd be more than happy to assist you."

"Thanks, but it's fine. This stuff is easy so I'll get it done," Riko replied as she solved another problem on her homework.

"Isn't everything supposed to be hard for people like you?" Rina asked innocently as the overly exuberant Yumiko licked her little palms.

"Rina. Watch your mouth," Arinao told her sternly, which made the petulant little girl go back to preferring the company of the dog. Riko paid no heed. After a couple minutes, she finally managed to reach the final problem and solve it without a hitch.

"Yes! Done and done!" Riko announced as she put the worksheet in her notebook, closed it, took it, and proceeded to walk back to her room and put it back in her book bag so she won't have to worry about it anymore. Arinao, Rina, and Yumiko were all left alone in the dining room together.

"Hey Dad?" Rina asked.

"Yes, Rina?"

"You're not gonna work at my school, are you?" Rina asked.

"I'm applying there, but I haven't gotten the job yet," Arinao replied.

Rina stuck out her lips in a pouty way. _'I don't want him to come to my school every day. If he does, he'll find out I haven't made any friends yet, and it's been almost a week already!'_ Rina thought.

"So, Rina, have you made any new friends yet?" Arinao asked.

"Uhh...I sure have! I made lots and lots of friends!" Rina exclaimed in a bit of a spoiled way, crossing her arms like she's a sassy TV star. "In fact, I'm friends with the entire classroom!"

"That's great. Why don't you tell me about them?" Arinao replied with a smile.

It's here that Rina stopped talking. But she didn't even get to talk anyway, as Saki came into the room. "Hey Rina! We're going to have your favorite today! Chicken sukiyaki!" Saki exclaimed happily.

"Really?! Yay! Thanks, Mom!" Rina cheered happily and glomped her joyful mother like she was the best thing in the whole world.

"It'll be done in a couple hours, but you'd better start on your homework, sweetie," Saki told her.

"But I don't like homework. It's boring!" Rina whined.

"I know, but wouldn't you rather get it done and over with so you don't forget?" Saki asked back.

'_Oneechan's already done with hers,'_ Rina thought before releasing her arms from her mother's waist. "Alright. But I don't like spelling," Rina mused to herself as she walked back to her room to start on her homework.

Riko made it to her room before Rina did. "Any luck finding your other sister?" Riko asked. Moonbeam read a book and Sunbeam ate some snacks she brought up. Both fairies shook their heads.

"We've looked everywhere, and she isn't anywhere in sight," Moonbeam mused sadly.

"I'm not surprised. Zenjin's power sent us pretty far from each other, and we've never been to this world before, so of course it'd be hard to find Lovebeam," Sunbeam told her.

"You've never been here before?" Riko asked, though she's not surprised.

"Nope. This is our very first time on Earth," Moonbeam told her. "By the way, Riko-chan, is this book your favorite?" Moonbeam asked, showing Riko a book she's reading.

"_A Little Princess_(1)? Yep, it's one of my favorites. There's an anime for it too, and I have all the DVDs!" Riko told her with a smile.

"Because I absolutely adore it so far! I'm already on the chapter where Mr. Carrisford moves in! I really don't understand how they can be so cruel to poor Sara! If the Rozanielans were in this book, they'd take her away so they can save her from all her suffering!" Moonbeam exclaimed excitedly, like a true fan girl. Riko couldn't help but laugh.

"You'd have to read the rest in order to see how it ends," Riko said. "By the way, what do you fairies like to do? Do you have any hobbies? Like drawing or playing?" She asked curiously.

"I like playing video games!" Sunbeam piped in as she finished a piece of chocolate flavored pocky. "Does cooking count as a hobby, too?"

"I think it does, yeah," Moonbeam replied.

"You can cook?" Riko asked, confused.

"Yep! I LOVE cooking all kinds of stuff! I can make seafood, pasta, breakfast stuff, and anything spicy!" Sunbeam exclaimed.

"But how can you cook when your arms have no hands or fingers? Won't you get burned?" Riko asked.

"I just can! I'd love to show you, but your family's here and I don't wanna scare them. Plus I can only cook recipes from Rozaniela, not Earth stuff, so I'll have to learn more about those. But I'll be careful!" Sunbeam exclaimed.

She found herself remembering a time when she and her sisters sat at a little round table in their little house, eating food that Sunbeam cooked and chatting happily amongst themselves, with a warm, blazing fire dancing in the fireplace, making the familiar crackling noise it always made. Sunbeam always took those times for granted, but only now did she realize how much they meant to her, especially now that she doesn't know where her parents are...or whether they're even alive or not.

"It's true. She's very good at it," Moonbeam piped in.

"But still...don't cookers have to have fingers? To be able to hold spoons and spatulas and pots and pans in certain ways? And won't everything fall and burn you?" Riko asked again, confused.

'_Does she always fixate on certain things she doesn't know about until she gets solid answers?'_ Moonbeam thought to herself silently, a little flummoxed by Riko's rather persistent train of thought. Moonbeam had to wonder if Riko doesn't believe Sunbeam can really cook unless she sees it with her own eyes. Then again, she can't blame her for being confused. Wouldn't anybody be confused just by seeing otherworldly creatures at all?

"Starbeam usually helps me with the heavy grunting work in that kinda stuff," Sunbeam piped in.

All of a sudden, the door to Riko's room flung open. Moonbeam and Sunbeam, not wanting to be exposed, remained as still as mannequins, hoping to pass as Riko's stuffed animals so whoever was coming in won't suspect anything or be shocked. Riko couldn't believe they could react so quickly like that. She wished she was as quick to react to something as they were. But not surprisingly to Riko, it was Arinao, who came into the room with a smile on his bearded face.

"Hi Riko. Do you want to go for a walk? Just the two of us this time," Arinao asked.

"Sure! I'd love to! I just gotta put my shoes and socks back on real quick," Riko said.

Arinao smiled again. "Take your time," He said before quietly leaving the room. Riko grabbed her white and yellow star themed socks and pulled them back on. Once she put them back on, she pushed her feet back into her sneakers.

"I'll be back soon, okay? Then once dinner comes around, I'll give you some. Bye! Meow!" Riko told them before she dashed out of her room, leaving Moonbeam and Sunbeam all by themselves.

"Thanks," Moonbeam and Sunbeam muttered in perfect unison once it was safe for them to move around again. Unbeknownst to Riko, Moonbeam and Sunbeam decided to fly out the window again, obviously to look for their other lost sister yet again.

Once Riko came down the steps, she and Arinao stepped out of the house to go for another nice little walk in the neighborhood. The scenery around them hadn't changed one bit, aside from quite a few piles of cherry blossoms seen in some people's front yards. The denizens of the neighborhood probably cleared out their sidewalks and streets when the blossoms fell. She couldn't really see why, though. Wouldn't they have just withered away whether they picked them up or not? Riko began losing herself in thought until Arinao began speaking.

"So tell me. What's this Anzu girl like? Is she nice?" Arinao asked.

"Yeah, she is. She sits with me and Kyo-chan at our lunch table now. She likes playing her harmonica and she likes anime and manga and games like I do. No one else really likes her, though," Riko replied with a smile.

"How come?" Arinao asked curiously, interested in knowing more.

"Dunno. Some kids say she's some stuck-up goth girl, but she isn't. I've met stuck-up people, and An-chan isn't one of them," Riko said. She then looked up at Arinao with a somewhat sad expression, stopping in her tracks. "Dad, why do people act like they know someone when they really don't and say mean stuff about them?"

"Some people are just like that, Ri-chan. Some people just have nothing better to do and feel that picking on people or acting like they know everything about someone they don't know is the best way for them to get by in life," Arinao explained as lucidly as he could, hoping she'd understand.

"That's stupid," Riko piped in. "Everyone says Asagi-san's gonna be bad because she's a criminal's kid, but it's not like she wanted a criminal for a dad. Right?"

"I agree," Arinao said, remembering his first encounter with the orange haired girl who bullied Riko on her first day, seeing that she was just a sad, broken little bird who everyone thinks is going to be bad through and through just because her dad happens to be in prison. Just seeing Marina be so nice to the kitten that day convinced him that there was at least some remaining good in her heart. If it was properly cultivated, Marina just might be able to abandon her bullying ways and see that not everyone thinks she's bad due to circumstances she can't control. "Some people are just stupid, Ri-chan. But not everybody's like that."

"And how come when people do tell them the truth, they don't listen at all and still act like they know stuff better than everyone else when they don't?"

"People can be really stubborn and closed-minded, where they just don't want to listen. Some people just won't shut up, take a breath, and get the facts. Not only that, some people might not believe you when you do tell them since you're so young. But I agree, it's stupid to say mean things to people and act like you know them when you really don't," Arinao explained calmly.

"Hello!" A voice suddenly exclaimed.

Riko whipped her head around. She knew that voice. Standing a few feet away was a slightly red faced Marina, who looked like she wanted to say something more. Arinao nudged his daughter gently, signaling her to reply back. Riko really needed to work on her social skills anyway.

"Hello," Riko replied sheepishly. The memory of their first meeting hadn't quite left her memory yet.

"Good afternoon. On your way home from school?" Arinao asked with a smile.

"Sorta. Yeah," Marina replied just as sheepishly. "How are you?"

"We're good. Thank you."

"Did you get to keep the kitten?" Riko asked.

"Mom says I can, but I really have to do well in school, quit being a jerk, do chores around the house, and take care of it. But it's better than nothing."

"I'm glad. What's its name?"

"Fern."

"Fern? Like the girl from Charlotte's Web?"

"Yeah."

"You don't look like the type who'd read or like reading."

"You think?"

Riko couldn't help the smile that crept onto her face when she replied like that. Perhaps Marina wasn't so bad after all. Maybe she really was a nice person inside. The nice person was obviously getting squashed down by closed-minded people.

Perhaps she needed a friend. In her heart, Riko wasn't sure if she wanted to be Marina's friend or not. She doesn't know if Marina likes manga or not, let alone the same mangas that she likes. But Arinao used to tell her that it's good to be friends with people who are different, so perhaps she could give this a try.

"You'd better get home. Your mother might be worried about you," Arinao piped in.

"I'm actually going to the dollar store to pick up some milk."

"I can take you."

"Thanks, but no thanks. I've done it lots of times. I better go. Bye," Marina told him shyly, then ran away, leaving Riko and Arinao alone.

"Isn't she a little young to be going out on her own?" Riko asked.

"Maybe. But we'd better get back home," Arinao replied.

* * *

"I'm back, Mom. I got the milk," Marina said as she came through the door of her house. The grey kitten she rescued, Fern, mewed happily, welcoming her back. The happy little kitten decided to rub itself against Marina's boots, causing the orange haired girl to smile sweetly.

"Hi, Fern," Marina replied.

"Hi, Mari," Marina's mother came into the living room, took the dollar store bag from her, took the milk out, and put it into the refrigerator. "I see you finished your homework early."

"Yeah. Figured I'd get it done and over with," Marina mused as she picked up an old-fashioned guitar from the living room.

Marina's mother smiled. "Your teachers told me you're doing so much better now, and it's only been the first week. I'm so proud of you," She said. Marina looked away from her to focus on her guitar. "I'll start dinner in a little bit. I'm making your favorite: shrimp, rice, and mandarin oranges. How's that?"

"Thanks, Mom," Marina said with a shy, sheepish smile as she walked into her room.

Her room wasn't much to write home about. Her walls were plain and white, with a few of them donning rock and roll posters with artists like Michael Jackson, N'Sync, The Blue Hearts, Kiss, The Beatles, Ozzy Osbourne, and others. She had a mahogany desk in her room with a shiny white laptop on it, some school books, some CDs, a black I-Pod with blue, ladybug themed ear buds attached to it, some mangas, multicolored mechanical pencils, some game consoles like a crimson red Nintendo 3DS, some games, and lots of guitar picks. Her bed had a white bed spread on it with lots of multicolored circles on it in many bright colors, with matching pillow cases.

On both sides of her windows were orange yellow curtains that had cross hatching patterns embroidered on them. Sitting underneath that was a set of bongos that were very worn, with some marks and scratches on them. Across from her bed was a closet full of clothes, and next to it was a black bureau with white stripes on it, making it look like a zebra. There was a white and orange lamp on it, a little orange and white jewelry box, a piggy bank shaped like a blue and purple fish, and some little rocks with messages branded into them, like _"Hope,"_ _"Friendship,"_ and _"Love."_ There were also a lot of notebooks with scribbles on them.

Marina flopped onto her bed, pulled out an orange guitar pick, and began to gently strum at her guitar. A soft rhythm flowed from the strings and into the halcyon atmosphere of her room. She bobbed her head at the swerving melody, allowing the rhythm to consume her mind and force the worries out of her brain. The smile she donned was quite a bright and blazing one, not something anyone ever saw on a face like hers before. Her wavy, curling orange hair bounced up and down with the bobbing of Marina's head. Soon, Marina found herself singing.

"_They say big things come in small packages,_

_And they're right, because I opened one,_

_And a miracle popped right out,_

_Like the sun during a stormy night._

_I never thought I'd see the day,_

_When someone finally saw me for me,_

_Finally seeing past the things that made me ugly,_

_The things people only see, what they choose to see._

_I didn't choose to be his daughter,_

_I don't want to be anything like him,_

_But they all think I'll be like him anyway,_

_Making people miserable,_

_Because that's what he does._

_They all hate me because of him,_

_They don't see me as a person, only his clone._

_But she did, she did and didn't think twice_

_About being nice to me when I needed it the most."_

She suddenly stopped singing when an image of Riko appeared in her head. The time when Riko saw her with Fern for the first time popped in her mind like a jack-in-a-box. Marina was flabbergasted at her appearance back then at first. She thought Riko was going to have her dad call her out on what she did, though Marina was willing to accept whatever punishment they'd heap on her.

But to her surprise, Riko wasn't mad at her, calling her names, or anything she expected. Even more surprising, she never mentioned her (Marina's) father. It didn't look like she even knew anything about him. All her dad did was gently press her on why she picked on people, and Riko just talked about her cats. Marina never had something like that happen to her before, and she never thought she'd ever be able to receive kindness from anyone besides her mother, because being hated and ostracized was all she was ever used to.

She was not used to having people be nice to her. A warm feeling creeped into her chest. She stopped strumming her guitar and put the guitar pick on her bed. She remembered Zenjin attacking her, and before losing consciousness, she heard Riko shout and ram into Zenjin, forcing him off of her. Then, when she woke up, she saw the purple cat girl don a frightened and anxious look once she saw the crowd of people, like the scared look Riko had when she walked into homeroom for the very first time this past Monday.

Marina couldn't deny it. Riko was nothing like the people she had to deal with throughout the majority of her life.

"_Get away from us, you wannabe criminal!"_

"_No way! We don't take criminals in our clique!"_

"_Why should we hang out with somebody who's related to a criminal?"_

"_They say children are born as they were raised. How do we know you're not going to act just like him when you get older?"_

"_She's the meanest girl around! You'd better steer clear of that orange headed bully!"_

"_We don't want to hang out with you. You're Asagi Shouji's daughter. Everybody knows he's bad news, so that makes you bad news too!"_

"_She gives some pretty good punches. Some kid got a black eye just from talking to her."_

Marina even remembered the deep, cold, bottomless pit of despair she fell into when she discovered the ugly truth. _"Why does everyone think I'm bad?"_ She asked tearfully back in those days, when kids yelled at her or ignored her in the 5th and 6th grades.

"_Because you are! Duh!"_

"_Yeah! It runs in your family!"_

She couldn't stand the preconceived notion everyone had about her: because she's the daughter of a criminal, she's going to automatically be just like him no matter what. Who decided that? And who gave them the right to do so? Nobody knew her. Nobody but Marina herself. Why would they act like they knew what she'd grow up to be when they don't even know her at all? She assumed her dad's crime and how sensationalized it was gave them pretext to pick on her and make themselves feel good. She never said anything bad to them unless they deserved it, so why would they say those things about her? It made her both frustratingly sad and internally sick to even try to comprehend their thick-headedness and complete stupidity.

Riko didn't act like them. The only reason Riko was mad at her was because she saw her picking on Kyoya, and felt the need to call her out on it, which Marina couldn't deny she did deserve, because everybody knows it's wrong to pick on a disabled person. But Riko never mentioned her father, nor did she act like she knew her or her dad. Marina couldn't believe she finally met someone who treated her like a human being. This was what made Marina feel bad about it later and apologize the next day. She never apologized to people she picked on, because they always picked on her due to their preconceived notions.

Not only that, they actually engaged in simple conversation a few times. Riko was even happy when she found out Marina agreed with her upon Yoshie getting called out on for breaking the school's dress code. Nobody ever agreed with her before. A different kind of smile painted itself onto Marina's face, complete with the warmth that creeped into her heart.

For the first time ever, she found she couldn't wait for school to come.

* * *

Riko basically spent the entire weekend playing with Moonbeam and Sunbeam, who still sometimes went out to find their remaining sister. Riko enjoyed every minute she spent with those fairies. She played with them, read to them, watched anime with them, played games with them, gave them whatever food they could eat, told them stories she made up (namely Twilight Cat ones), and taught them whatever she could. Riko could herself being enveloped by a very warm and loving glow she never experienced before when she was around them. It was the same as when she began hanging out with Anzu and Kyoya. She couldn't believe that she finally made friends for the very first time, both human and non-human, and she couldn't be happier.

When everyone was away, Riko played outside with them, and even the fairies couldn't help but enjoy Riko's company, charmed by her sweet nature, her compassionate heart, her occasional eccentricities, the cute way she dressed herself up in cat eared hats and fuzzy tails and pretended she was Twilight Cat and how into it she acted, her innocent, childlike mind, her wish to make them happy by any means necessary, and the fact that she practically accepted them without question. Normal people would likely be scared out of their wits if they saw them. Riko just accepted them into her life and didn't look back. The radiant look she exuded with her wide eyes and bright smile only cemented this fact.

However, overtime, Moonbeam and Sunbeam began to notice some odd things about Riko. Nothing bad, just unusual, not enough to make them change their minds about her. True, Riko had been unquestionably kind to them. But they noticed that Riko often displayed some odd mannerisms at times, like flapping her hands up and down, rocking back and forth a little bit, swaying back and forth when standing for a long period of time, the fact that she often can't seem to come up with the right words when making a sentence, getting fixated on an idea for a long time until she's satisfied, among other things. But the thing they noticed the most, something Kyoya noticed, was that she practically never looked anyone in the eye, even the fairies. They didn't see these habits as bad, just a little odd. But they couldn't help but be curious as to why she acts the way she does. For now, they decided not to ask about it. They were afraid they might push the wrong buttons and ruin their new friendship.

They did, however, notice that Rina, Riko's little sister, was quite mean to her, constantly pushing her buttons and yelling at her over little things, like her play acting, the way she holds her eating utensils, the way she talks, and anything else Riko does. This, they found very unsettling.

After a peaceful and happy weekend, Riko went back to school. But instead of dreading it entirely, Riko finally found something to look forward to: hanging out with Anzu and Kyoya. But other things happened during the first half of school. For example, Marina corrected the teacher's math problem, noticing that something was wrong with it. Later, she confronted some kids for picking on the girl whose ring she found recently. Riko, Kyoya, and Anzu witnessed all of it.

At lunch, Riko did something that surprised Kyoya. "Asagi-san! Wanna sit with us?"

Marina stopped the minute she heard Riko's voice. Something inside her kept screaming at her to go sit with them. She did. "Uhh...is that okay?"

"Sure!" Riko chirped with a smile.

"I'm all for it," Anzu said.

Kyoya said nothing.

Marina smiled and sat with them. Riko found herself happy that she was surrounded by her friends and that she made Marina happy.

But friends don't always hang out at school, do they? Hikage always had friends over back at their previous town, and Riko couldn't help but envy him in that aspect. Perhaps she could invite Anzu or Kyoya over some day. Coincidentally enough, Anzu wound up bringing up the subject at recess that very Monday.

"Hey. Do you guys wanna hang out sometime? Outside of school, I mean," Anzu asked curiously with a Sailor Moon manga in one of her hands.

"I'd love that!" Kyoya exclaimed cheerfully. "But my parents work every day except on Wednesdays and Thursdays."

"My mom's off work on Thursdays!" Riko piped in. Then a light bulb lit up in her head, making her gasp with a face radiating joy. She clasped her hands together. "I know! You should come to my house!"

"Your house?" Anzu asked.

"Yeah...or is that not a good idea?" Riko replied.

"That's a great idea," Kyoya said, eyeing Anzu.

"I second that," Anzu piped in.

"But I'll have to ask my parents first. Is that okay?" Riko told them.

"Sure," Kyoya and Anzu said in unison.

"Oh!" Riko suddenly exclaimed, then became a little downcast. "There's one problem though. My room's upstairs, the cars aren't big enough, and we have no ramps, so my house isn't...wheelchair accessible."

"So? Mine isn't either," Kyoya replied.

"Wait. What?" Riko and Anzu both asked in perfect unison, confused.

"Yours isn't?" Riko asked.

"Yeah. I've only been in this thing for a year and a half. My room's upstairs, too. But I can crawl now, so I know how to get around," Kyoya told them with a smile. "Don't worry about it, Ri-chan. I'm not as paralyzed as I was before."

"Alright. But I still have to ask my parents if they'll let you come or not. Here, I'll write down my home address and phone number to you too," Riko said as she pulled out a piece of paper and pencil from her book bag, wrote something down, tore the paper in half, and gave each half to Kyoya and Anzu.

"Can I borrow that pencil real quick?" Kyoya asked. Riko nodded and handed it to him as he pulled a paper out of his own bag. He wrote something down, tore the paper into two pieces, and handed both of them to Riko and Anzu. "There's my address and phone number, so you can call me the minute you get an answer."

"Here's mine. I wrote them down at lunch," Anzu said as she handed them two crumpled pieces of paper of her own.

"Thanks, An-chan!" Riko said, her eyes and smile full of gratitude. "I've never had friends over before. I always used to get mad at my big brother for always having friends over. Sometimes I asked myself, _'Why does he have friends and not me?'_ and Rina would always say, _'Because he's normal and you're not! You'll never have any friends because you're weird and stupid'_ and that always made me angry," Riko explained.

"I'd love to smack that sister of yours," Kyoya piped in.

Riko was going to say something until she saw Marina a little ways away, leaning against the fence, lost in thought. Then another idea popped into her head. "Ooooh!" She mused and suddenly dashed off.

"Hey! Where ya going?" Anzu asked. Their eyes widened when they saw Riko approach Marina rather cheerfully.

"Hey! Asagi-san!"

"Whoa!" Marina yelped, surprised by Riko's sudden appearance. "You scared me! Jeez!"

"Sorry. Didn't mean to. Anyway...are you free this Thursday?" Riko apologized.

"I don't do much every day, so yeah. Why?" Marina asked, confused.

"Would you like to...come over my house and hang out?" Riko asked as she rummaged through her pocket to get some more paper. She pulled it out and wrote down her address, completely oblivious to Marina's flabbergasted expression.

"Uh…" Marina was speechless. Riko was actually inviting her to her house? Even after calling her names and pushing her to the concrete on the first day? Was good luck finally shining on her at last?

"Here's my address. I still have to ask my parents first. If you don't want to, that's okay," Riko said.

"Um…" Marina stammered, finding her voice. "Why are you doing this? I mean...I was so cruel to you last week. Don't you hate me?"

"Not anymore, now that I know what you're really like," Riko replied.

"Umm...do you even know who my dad is at all?"

"No. Only that he's a criminal, and that's because I've heard it from everyone else, but that's about all I know."

'_She doesn't know about him?! Everybody knows about him! How come she doesn't?!'_ Marina thought, even more flabbergasted by Riko's innocent honesty and the fact that she knows next to nothing of her dad. Then again, she could think of some possibilities for her lack of knowledge: maybe she didn't see his crimes on the news, maybe she's too focused on her own problems to pay attention to stuff like that, or she simply just didn't hear about it, or not interested in hearing about it.

"By the way," Marina piped in.

"Yeah?" Riko asked.

"Can I ask you something else?"

"Sure. What?"

Marina wasn't sure if she could ask something like this. But she gathered her mettle and decided to cut to the chase. "Are you Cure Twilight?"

Riko couldn't help but let out a low but still high pitched screech. "EEEEK! How...how...how…" Riko stammered, unable to put words together.

"...do I know? You two have the same eyes, voice, skin color, and body type," Marina replied curtly. "It's okay. I'm not gonna tell anyone. I promise. I'm not that stupid."

Riko wanted to press her for more details, but the bell rang so they had to go back to class. Riko became anxious all throughout the rest of the school day, fearing the worst. Would Marina tell? Would everyone know about it and demonize her forever? Riko immediately began regretting her attempts to try and befriend her. However, she had to put her anxiety away when 7th period began.

Out of nowhere, when Mr. Amane was going over water's main properties, a kid sitting next to the window spotted something outside.

"Whoa! There's a fight going on outside!" The boy shouted, prompting all of the kids to flock to the window, much to Mr. Amane's chagrin.

But it wasn't a bunch of kids throwing fists at each other, as Riko saw. Rays of light were being shot from both sides. They came from an angry Zenjin and a stoic looking Cure Starlight. Riko saw someone else caught in the crossfire. A young bearded man.

Suddenly, without warning, Zenjin shot a ray of light right at the window they were looking out of.

"GET OUT OF THE WAY!" Mr. Amane screamed as loud as he could, prompting the kids to get the heck away from the window. But even though they moved away, the window and the wall surrounding it exploded. Smoke enveloped the classroom. Everyone who managed to get out of the explosion's way stayed down on the floor so as to not inhale the smoke.

They rolled out of the classrooms like armadillos. When they got out, they stood back up and got away from the smoke. When there's smoke, stop, drop, and roll. Riko and some other kids did just that. It's a good thing teachers drilled that lesson into their heads. But as it dissipated, a scream could be heard.

"Amane-sensei! Fukiko's trapped in some debris!" Someone cried out, only slightly drowned out by the piercing cries of a girl trapped under some debris, right next to the big hole in the wall. Riko peered inside to find that the girl, Fukiko, was actually the girl who's been watching her and Kyoya, Dounowaki. But Fukiko's leg was trapped underneath some rubble.

"I can't get it out!" Fukiko yelled tearfully as she tried to pull the debris off of her leg, but it was just too heavy.

"Stay still, Dounowaki. Someone call 119! Get a teacher! Get someone! Now!" Mr. Amane yelled as he ran to Fukiko's side to try and pry the debris off of her leg.

"I'll do it!" One girl cried out. Riko, finding this to be the perfect opportunity to escape and help Cure Starlight, dashed after her.

Once she went into the hallway, she went in a different direction. She went into the bathroom, transformed, and dashed out onto the front lawn and onto the street, where she found the man strapped to a big wall, with his Soul Portal open and exposed, with Cure Starlight trying to fend off Zenjin with a big, blue naginata.

"Leave him alone! He doesn't need to be involved in this!" Cure Starlight sneered.

"Be quiet! I'm gonna look in his Soul Portal and you can't stop me!" Zenjin yelled as he tried to land a punch on her, but Starlight swerved the tip of her naginata upward to stop him from punching her.

"Twilight Sparkle!" Suddenly, a glowing purple ring hit Zenjin on the back, knocking him off of his feet and onto the concrete.

"OW! Hey, watch it, trash!" Zenjin yelled angrily as he felt his palms and knees rub against the concrete, feeling them get scraped.

"Cure Twilight! Thank goodness you're here!" Cure Starlight exclaimed with relief once Riko, now Cure Twilight, hopped onto the scene.

"You okay? You look like he got you pretty bad," Cure Twilight asked with concern in her voice and eyes, noticing some pretty nasty marks on parts of Starlight's body.

"It's nothing. We have to free Uomisaki-san quick!" Cure Starlight was about to free the man until a ray of light hit her on the back, knocking her off of her own feet.

"Starlight!" Cure Twilight exclaimed as she managed to grab her friend by the arm and keep her from hitting the concrete. Unfortunately for her, Zenjin flew over to the man and peered into his Soul Portal quicker than she could react. The man screamed like he was in an unknown degree of excruciating pain. Cure Twilight, angered, decided to take things into her own hands.

"Get off of him!" Cure Twilight yelled as she leaped toward the floating boy and rammed him off of the man, similar to how she did when he was attacking Marina. Unfortunately, he managed to yank out his soul. The wall the man was strapped to disappeared and his vessel almost hit the concrete if Cure Starlight didn't save it from hitting it.

The cobalt blue orb immediately turned black as soon as it hit Zenjin's hand. "Pheh. He doesn't know either. Oh well. Go crazy, Human Trash!" Zenjin mused at first, then threw the glowing orb into the air, causing it to grow in size until it transformed into a huge, black, dog-like creature. It looked like a German Shepherd.

"Dawn Flame!" A golden flame suddenly shot at Zenjin out of nowhere. He looked up to find Anzu, now Cure Dawn, with her glowing yellow nunchucks in her hands, staring him down. "You're fighting me, bucko!"

"Cure Dawn!" Twilight exclaimed as she threw her glowing ring at the giant German Shepherd, but it managed to evade it. Teachers and children began evacuating the school rather erratically.

"I'll distract it from the front! You attack it from behind, and make sure it doesn't hurt anyone! Got it?!" Cure Starlight commanded like an elite military officer.

"You got it! Meow!" Cure Twilight exclaimed as she jumped on the roof of the school, preparing for another attack. Starlight got her naginata out and began slashing the German Shepherd's legs in an attempt to render it motionless, so it at least wouldn't hurt anyone with those big claws it has.

"_I'm sorry!"_ The contorted voice of the German Shepherd-or the man's-barked sadly as it tried to smack Cure Starlight away. As soon as she saw one of its front paws move, she leaped into the air and did a mid-air back flip to evade its attack, which proved to be successful.

"Cat Slash!" As soon as she saw the last of the students and faculty leave-Mr. Amane with a limp and unconscious Fukiko in his arms-she leaped off of the school roof, settled onto the German Shepherd's back, and gave it some big scratches, causing it to bark and begin flailing, trying to throw a bewildered Cure Twilight off of it. She held on as tight as she could. She tried to punch it, but it moved too much and too fast for her to hold onto its fur anymore, so she wound up sliding off like a piece of bacon, landing feet first onto the sidewalk.

"_I'm sorry! I never meant for it to happen!"_ The German Shepherd howled as it tried to bite Cure Starlight, but in retaliation, she leaped in front of it and gave it a swift kick in the face. It wasn't enough to knock it unconscious though, so she and Cure Twilight delivered some strong punches instead. Those didn't work either, as the giant German Shepherd swerved its face around, throwing both Cures Starlight and Twilight onto the street. _"It's my fault! I get it! I deserve whatever punishment you give me! But...stop making it sound like I did it on purpose! It wasn't on purpose! I'm not a heartless monster!"_

"He sounds so sad…" Cure Twilight mused to herself sadly, her heart going out to the man's corrupted soul.

On Cure Dawn's part of the conflict, she and Zenjin were mostly in a punching and kicking contest, trying to knock each other out, but neither side was successful. Punches and kicks flew at each other, not landing a single hit. Cure Dawn even tried hitting him with his nunchucks, but he managed to evade them despite their agility. When he found an opening in her stance, he snapped his fingers, and a black ray of light knocked Cure Dawn's nunchucks to the sidewalk.

She grabbed them as soon as they fell, but she then noticed he was trying to flee the scene by flying away. With a great leap, she jumped into the sky like a bird ascending into the sky and grabbed Zenjin, successfully pulling him back to the ground. Zenjin struggled with all of his might, writhing and wriggling like a worm, trying to get out of her grasp, but Cure Dawn only tightened her grip, not wanting to let this silver haired scoundrel get away.

"Let me go, you trash!" Zenjin yelled vehemently as he kicked Cure Dawn in her legs. As painful as his crimson red boots felt, she tried to keep her composure and not cry out, as containing this crazy psychopath is more important.

"Not until you tell me what your deal is, bucko!" Cure Dawn told him sternly.

"My name's not bucko! It's Zenjin, you trash!" He snapped back.

"_If I could turn back time and fix my mistake, I'd do it in a heartbeat!"_ The German Shepherd howled again as Cure Twilight slashed one of its ears.

"Starlight Shower!" A shower of glowing blue stars rained from the sky, falling onto the German Shepherd and keeping him from attacking.

"I gotta move his body!" Cure Twilight mused as she ran to the man's vessel, picked it up, and tried to carry it to a safe place. However, she found that he was too heavy for her to pull up until she noticed he got lighter. She turned around to find that someone is helping her. But it wasn't Cure Starlight or Cure Dawn. It wasn't even a fellow warrior helping her out.

"...Asagi?!" Cure Twilight yelped with surprise.

"Figured you'd need some help," Marina said as she held up another part of the man's body. As confused as Twilight was, she knew she needed to get the man's body out of danger. If it were destroyed, then saving his soul from corruption would be pointless, so they quietly moved him to the far side of the blacktop, far from the German Shepherd's line of sight. Cure Twilight was about to thank Marina until she realized that she's dashing right toward Zenjin and Cure Dawn, who are still fighting like cats and dogs.

"Dawn Burst!" With both sides of her nunchucks in both hands, glowing radiantly like the sun above, she slammed them into the concrete, causing a huge dome of light to appear and cover all sides within a 20 meter radius, causing Cure Starlight to stammer a little and Zenjin to be thrown at a big tree like a rag doll. But he got right back up as soon as he slumped onto the grass.

"I don't have time to deal with you pieces of trash! I have things to do!" Zenjin snapped angrily.

"We have things to do too, y'know! If you know what's good for you, turn the guy back to normal and turn yourself in! Now spill the beans! Why are you going around corrupting people's souls?!" Cure Dawn exclaimed, not showing any fear, surprisingly.

"I don't need to answer to you, trash!" Zenjin snapped.

"HEY!" Someone yelled. Cure Dawn and Zenjin both turned around to discover Marina only a few feet away from them, staring at the silver haired, red caped boy quite angrily. "You're that idiot who attacked me last week!"

"Oh great! Not you again!" Zenjin yelled as he shot a black ray of light at her, but she managed to leap out of the way and charge right at him.

"You're gonna pay for attacking me, bucko!" Marina yelled as she leaped onto Zenjin like a rabid cat trying to attack its prey.

"Quit calling me bucko! It's NOT my name, you trash!" Zenjin snapped as he flailed his arms around, trying to pry the crazed, orange haired girl off of him.

"Asagi! Stop! He's too dangerous! Get off of him!" Cure Dawn tried to pry Marina off of him, but she quickly found out she didn't have to. Zenjin shot a ray of light at Marina, causing her to fly at Cure Dawn like a rocket.

"You did this, didn't you?! You corrupted the guy's soul! Why?! Are you really that heartless?!" Marina yelled as she stood up, prying Cure Dawn's hands off of her.

Cure Starlight and Cure Twilight both turned to look when they heard Marina's voice. Unfortunately, this allowed the giant German Shepherd to swat Cure Twilight like a housefly, sending her flying onto the blacktop. Cure Starlight tried to slash it with her naginata, but the German Shepherd swatted her away, too. Cure Twilight, despite being battered by the fall, saw Marina standing up to Zenjin and ran toward them.

"Asagi! You have to get away from him! He'll kill you!" Cure Twilight yelled, but Marina paid no heed.

"She's right! Let us handle this!" Cure Dawn tried to convince Marina to back down, but the orange haired girl's eyes were blazing with anger. She didn't listen to the yellow warrior's pleas, or anyone's for that matter.

"You think everybody's a toy you can play with, don't you?! Using their sadness and suffering to make yourself feel strong...you're sick, y'know that?! This isn't some toy you can play with! That man you corrupted is someone who's suffering because he unknowingly made a mistake that cost him and other people dearly!" Marina yelled vehemently, remembering the day he yanked her soul out of her body without batting an eye.

"That stupid man doesn't know the _meaning_ of the word suffering! None of you worthless idiots do! Only _I_ know suffering! My suffering is far greater than anyone else's will ever be! Do you wish to feel suffering?! Because I'll gladly make you writhe in pain, now that I have all the power in the world to do so!" Zenjin yelled back, his hand glowing in a black light.

"In your dreams, bub!" Marina snapped. _'Jeez. Talk about a big ego, and seriously! He calls people trash like it's the most normal thing in the world! God, can I punch him please?' _Marina thought as she fought the urge to punch this silver haired, foul mouthed brat.

"Twilight Sparkle!" Cure Twilight tried to hit Zenjin with her glowing ring, but he evaded it, causing it to hit the police station across the street. Glass from a window broke, and some debris fell from one of the walls, hitting the floor.

"Ack! I didn't mean to do that!" Cure Twilight yelped ruefully.

Cure Dawn facepalmed. "Really?" She asked, exasperated by Riko's failed attempt at attacking Zenjin just now.

"Follow that Heart Lighter!" Cure Twilight recognized the voice. It belonged to Starbeam. She and everyone else looked up to find the three fairies-Moonbeam, Sunbeam, and Starbeam-following a glowing orange Heart Lighter with an orange flame on the top of it. The Heart Lighter, with a orange light inside it glowing like a radiant sunset, suddenly floated in front of Marina.

"No way! Is she…?" Cure Twilight yelped, surprised beyond her wildest dreams.

"Do I...open this?" Marina asked.

"Yeah! Hurry!" Cure Starlight yelled as she tried to slash the giant German Shepherd with her naginata again.

On impulse, Marina did as asked and pried the cap of the Heart Lighter open. The tips of the flame shaped cap dug into her palms, scratching them a bit, but Marina didn't quite care at this point. She was just confused and inundated by too much going on at once and with no idea why. Once she pulled off the cap, the orange light flew out. Marina grabbed it, and the light dissipated, revealing an orange, heart shaped jewel with a red flame in the middle of it. She also noticed the orange Heart Lighter has a hollow area in the middle, shaped like the heart, that wasn't there before.

"What the freak is going on?! What do I do with these?!" Marina asked, confused.

"Put the jewel in the cavity and shout, _'Pretty Cure! Let the light shine!'_ and it'll do the rest!" Cure Twilight shouted.

"Why?! What's gonna happen?!" Marina yelped before suddenly getting hit by a black ray of light shot by Zenjin. The Heart Lighter and the jewel are both safe in her hands.

"Oh, no you don't!" Sunbeam shouted as she and the fairies decided to do what Cure Dawn did and try their hardest to keep Zenjin from getting away.

"Come on, Asagi-san! Just do it! You have to!" Cure Twilight begged desperately.

"What if something goes wrong?!" Marina yelped fearfully.

"Just DO IT!"

"OKAY OKAY! FINE!"

All Marina wanted to do was make sense of all of this craziness and give Zenjin some well deserved comeuppance for attacking her last week. She wasn't sure how putting some jewel into a star shaped perfume bottle was going to help anything. But with nothing to lose, and fear consuming her from the inside and out, along with the courage she tried to muster, she put the jewel into the hollow area, allowing a tsunami of sunset orange light to consume her like a tsunami.

"Pretty Cure, let the light shine!" She shouted as she held the Heart Lighter in the air. The heart object dissolved into the perfume bottle, not only filling in the gap, but filling the bottle with a kind of translucent, mandarin orange liquid.

Marina spun around in circles and sprayed it all over herself. As soon as the perfume made contact with her normal clothes, they changed completely! Instead of her usual attire, she found herself donning a sleeveless pale orange and white shirt with little orange flames going down the chest part, along with some lacy, pointed white frills on each side of them, along with a pair of darker orange shorts. A large, dark orange ribbon appeared on her shirt with a shiny lighter orange flame decoration on it. The straps on her shirt were orange, just like her hair, and they looked like arm bands if her ribbon covered the angular piece of fabric connecting the straps on her shoulders and the straps around her upper arms. A small, pale orange, blanket-like cloth with darker orange pockets on each side wrapped around her waist, with the ends connected to the front by an orange flame-shaped, belt-like decoration. Fingerless, dark orange gloves appeared on both of her hands, but they went up to her forearms, and had red flames painted on the part of them that started from her upper arms. A little dark orange flame like jewel appeared underneath her right eye, like a beauty mark. Her boots were sunset orange, with red blazing flames painted on the bottom parts of them, with little white wings on each of them. The Heart Lighter dangled from her shorts like a little keychain. Soon, the light surrounding her dissipated, bringing her back to Earth.

"I am the light that will warm your heart, Cure Dusk!" Marina, announcing her fabulous entrance as Cure Dusk, struck a pose. But as soon as she finished, her previous confusion came back in full force. "Uhhh...what the heck am I supposed to be? And what the heck am I saying?!"

"_Why does everyone think I did it to hurt people?! I didn't! Why don't they listen to me?!"_ Finally tired of being trapped, the giant German Shepherd finally decided to run from the school.

"No! Twilight Serenade!" Cure Twilight, aware of what could happen if that giant animal ran loose, shot a beam of light at it, managing to knock it down. Unfortunately for her, the black German Shepherd wound up falling on the blacktop, completely squishing a huge chunk of the metal fence flat like a pancake, just barely missing the man's body.

If the man's body got destroyed, his soul can't return to it.

"ACK! Oh no!" Cure Twilight screamed as she hopped toward the part of the blacktop where she placed Toyoki's body. _'Please be alright! Please be alright! Please be alright! PLEEEEASE BE ALRIGHT!'_ She screamed in her head, begging for his body to be safe and not destroyed. Much to her relief, the body has been spared, Soul Portal and all. She exhaled a huge sigh of relief.

"Dawn Flame!" Cure Dawn shot some golden flames at the German Shepherd, which made it howl in pain once they danced around it blazingly.

"Hey! Cure Dusk!" Starbeam exclaimed, which made Marina yelp.

"Yeek! What the heck are you?!" Cure Dusk yelped, surprised by the fact that there's a cute talking animal floating near her.

"No time to explain! Your weapon is in your pocket! You can use it to help the other Cures and purify the officer's soul!" Starbeam explained.

"Urrrgh! Fine! I'll just go along with it!" Cure Dusk grunted as she rummaged through her pockets and pulled something out, which turned into an orange bow and arrow.

Cure Dusk found herself smiling. Her eyes sparkled. "Sweetness," Soon, when she set up her bow and arrow, the tip of the arrow suddenly lit itself ablaze with orange flames.

"Alrighty then! Show me what you can do! Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Cure Dusk edicted boldly as she let the arrow loose. The arrow plummeted straight into the fallen German Shepherd's abdomen, causing it to howl in pain. She turned to Starbeam. "Can I do anything besides use this stuff?"

"Yes. There's energy flowing in your bodies, and you can manipulate it to your will," Starbeam explained.

"Good! Because I seriously wanna let off some steam!" Cure Dusk exclaimed as she put her bow and arrow away and pumped her fists. Suddenly, they glowed in a blazing orange light. "Dusk Medley!" With a few arm movements, fiery music notes shot out from her fists, dancing around the flummoxed black German Shepherd wildly.

"This is my chance!" Cure Twilight exclaimed as she readied herself. "Twilight Sparkle!" She threw her ring again. But this time, the German Shepherd evaded it again, almost hitting Cure Dusk in the face had Cure Starlight not knocked it back with her naginata.

"Be careful!" Cure Starlight snapped.

"Sorry! I didn't mean it!" Cure Twilight wailed frightfully, cowed by Cure Starlight's sudden change in temperament. Hotaru was normally never angry, so Riko couldn't help but be frightened.

"So this is that guy's soul, huh? Better purify it! Dusk Flame!" Cure Dusk mused to herself as she shot some orange flames around the German Shepherd. It howled and barked as it was consumed by the orange flames, its black fur disintegrating until it turned back into a cobalt blue orb. Cure Twilight was the first to pick it up, take it to the man's Soul Portal, and gently drop it back in. All of the Pretty Cures left the blacktop as soon as he regained his color.

"Yay! We did it again! You're one of us now, Asagi-san!" Cure Twilight exclaimed cheerfully. But much to everyone's surprise, she was completely oblivious to the fact that Cure Dusk had a very grim, insulted look on her face, like it was full of nothing but contempt. "You were so awesome out there-"

"You idiot!" Cure Dusk yelled, which made Cure Twilight step back in fear. Cure Dusk gave the frightened Cure Twilight a very angry look, her golden eyes donning a feral, animal-like sheen. "You almost killed me back there with that freakin' boomerang of yours! Not only that, you knocked that giant dog right next to his body! You could have killed him if that thing actually did fall on him, and you almost destroyed the police station across the street!" The happy look on Twilight's face was literally wiped away like a big mess on a kitchen floor, replaced with a face that made her look like she was about to burst into tears at any given moment.

"I'm sorry! I didn't mean it! Honest!" Cure Twilight shot back with fear and confusion consuming her, but Cure Dusk didn't back down. Riko's eyesight began to blur, and her hypersensitive ears were being bombarded by the sheer loudness that is Marina's yelling.

"You almost ruined this whole thing! Don't you know how to be careful?!" Cure Dusk yelled, refusing to back down.

"Hey! Calm down, will you?!" Cure Dawn exclaimed as she hopped in between the frightened Cure Twilight and the angry Cure Dusk. "Look, she didn't mean anything bad by any of this. She was just trying to help! That's all! She didn't know the giant dog was gonna evade her attack, and even if we were careful trying to fight that thing, it'd still destroy some stuff anyway! And besides, we're all new at this here, and you're right, we do need to be more careful. Sorry for all this craziness. But you don't have to take it out on Riko here! Yeah, she almost hit you with her boomerang and her attacking the dog got the police station roughed up, but it was an accident! It's not like she wanted those to happen! Take a breath, will you? Look at her! Riko looks like she's about to cry any minute!" Anzu proclaimed boldly but calmly and lucidly, then pointing to Riko, whose face was the very definition of fear and remorse right now.

As ordered, Marina did take a breath. A pretty deep one. Soon, her angry look dissipated, and a remorseful and utterly exhausted expression got painted on her worried face instead. "Sorry. All this craziness is making me frustrated."

"We feel you, but try to express your frustration in healthier ways instead of taking it out on your comrades," Cure Starlight said.

'_I don't even know if I can call her a comrade,'_ Riko thought as she tried to regain what was left of her composure, if she even had any at all after getting yelled at like that. A very small twinge of regret began sneaking into her heart. Perhaps being friends with Marina was a bad idea after all?

"AGH!" The wails of the fairies drew their attention back to the street, where they found Moonbeam and Sunbeam injured and lying on the street, with an irritated Zenjin giving them the stinkeye.

"Annoying little pests. Let me do what I want!" Zenjin sneered as the girls went to tend to the fairies. He turned around on his heel and almost left until Sunbeam flew out of Riko's arms, fuming.

"ZENJIIIIIN! DON'T YOU WALK AWAY FROM MEEEE!" Sunbeam screamed in her loudest voice possible, which finally made Zenjin stop in his tracks. But he didn't turn around to look at her. Everyone froze in place, wondering what the heck Sunbeam is doing, putting herself in more potential danger. It didn't seem like Zenjin was interested in dealing with her anymore, however, so he likely didn't feel the need to attack her again.

"I...I just want to know! Why are you doing all of this?! Did we do something wrong?! We...We were nice to you! We saved you from that evil woman! We gave you everything she never gave you, and yet...you had to go and do all of this...why, Zenjin?!" Sunbeam cried desperately, her face contorting with sadness, confusion, and anger, all in one. "Why did you betray all of us?! Especially me! I've been nice to you! I've tried to make you happy! I...I thought we were FRIENDS!" Now the tears came pouring out of Sunbeam's desperate, pleading blue eyes.

The girls' eyes widened in complete, unadulterated shock. _'Sunbeam and Zenjin? Friends? No way!'_ Riko thought, becoming even more confused. Sunbeam and Zenjin? Friends? That just couldn't be the case. How in the wide wide world of Earth could a heartless, devious, nefarious, mischievous, crazy teenaged psychopath with no sense of guilt, empathy, or remorse and a cheerful, happy-go-lucky little fairy possibly be friends? If what Sunbeam is saying is true, Riko just couldn't comprehend such a far out idea. Neither could everyone else, apparently.

"Was the friendship we had just a big fat lie?!" Sunbeam cried as loud as she could, hoping Zenjin would hear. He did.

All throughout her speech, Zenjin never turned around. He just listened and stared at the scenery in front of him, taking in Sunbeam's pleas and cries. Nobody could tell what he was thinking, because they couldn't see his face or read his mind. All they saw was the back of his head, strung with sterling silver hair. An awkward silence creeped between them for about a few minutes, the tension being quite tense, until a snicker broke it. The snicker then evolved into chuckling, and then into full-on laughter, something very inopportune in a dire situation like this. Even Sunbeam couldn't help but be appalled.

"Friendship? Us? Friends? There was never any friendship! You were never my friend at all, you hairy little rat! I NEVER liked you!" Zenjin yelled arrogantly. Sunbeam could seriously hear her heart break into pieces. It felt like glass was being broken in her little chest. "In fact…" Zenjin turned around, with an insouciant, almost calm and content expression on his face, making full eye contact with Sunbeam. But he donned a small smile, which seemed very inappropriate.

Especially with what even came out of his mouth right then and there.

"You're a curse. You should never have been born. More importantly..._you don't exist_."

If the apocalypse happened right then and there, Sunbeam wouldn't notice, because an internal apocalypse happened right within her heart. She froze mid-air, her blue eyes wider than she thought they could muster. Zenjin turned back around and teleported away, not wanting to sit around and deal with any potential waterworks. Nobody had the courage to zap him or attack him or anything. They were just too tired from everything that went on. Fighting a giant dog, Marina becoming Cure Dusk, Riko getting yelled at for blunders she didn't intend, and now Sunbeam's heart has been cruelly ripped to pieces, stomped on, and left to get stomped on some more, if such a thing was possible.

Sunbeam's blue eyes literally lost their shine and everything else as soon as Zenjin opened his mouth. The shine in her coat vanished into thin air. Sunbeam's throat closed up. She couldn't say anything more. Her plump, curled ears drooped downward, facing the concrete, limp and lifeless. Her eyes now looked like those belonging to an abandoned puppy.

Fearfully, Riko finally mustered the mettle to try and walk toward the completely heartbroken fairy. But every step she took felt like she had titanium bricks duct taped to her feet. Then again, she was exhausted from today's fight, so it was understandable. But she didn't want to just leave Sunbeam there, looking so sad, so broken, so somber, so downright destroyed by the cruel things Zenjin said to her, if what Sunbeam mentioned about them supposedly being friends is true. But once Riko got close enough, she stopped, because Sunbeam found her voice.

"Zenjin...you...you...you…" Sunbeam muttered quietly at first, then, at the top of her voice, she shouted at the sky, causing Riko to cover her ears again, using what's left of her vocal chords, "YOU IDIOOOOT! I HATE YOOOOU! WE SHOULD HAVE LEFT YOU TO SUFFER AT THAT EVIL WOMAN'S HAAAAAND!"

With that, Sunbeam let out piercing and passionate wails as she flew away like a housefly, far away.

"Sunbeam! Wait!" Riko tried to catch her, but the crying fairy was too fast for her, and she wasn't sure where she'd go. Sunbeam left the scene in tears, leaving Riko, Anzu, Hotaru, Marina, Moonbeam, and Starbeam behind.

A tear slithered out of one of Riko's eyes and down her cheek as she heard the sad fairy's cry echo in the air. "Sunbeam…"


	6. Sunbeam and Zenjin Were Friends?

Chapter 6: Poor Sunbeam! She and Zenjin were friends?!

"Umm…" Returning to her old self, feeling bogged down by everything that just happened, understandably, Marina finally broke the silence. "Want to come to my house and cool down? It's a bit of a trek, though," She suggested in a soft voice.

"Sure. That's fine. Thanks for the offer," Hotaru said once she turned back. "We'll explain everything when we get there. Is that okay?" She asked.

"Yeah," Marina replied weakly.

"Come on," Anzu said softly as she scooped a weak and tired Moonbeam in her arms. Starbeam floated onto Hotaru's left shoulder. She's fine because she left the fight against Zenjin early due to feeling obligated to help a frazzled Marina cope with the fact that she's a Pretty Cure and help her fight.

"Shouldn't we get our stuff first?" Riko asked, her eyes puffy and red with tears.

"Oh yeah," Marina agreed. They went back to their now completely empty classrooms, got their stuff, and followed Marina to where her house was, leaving the school behind.

Marina's right. The house is a little far from the school. The girls didn't mind, though. They just wanted to walk off the bad feelings that were tangled up in their brains and thoughts, hoping to knock away the confusing cobwebs and release the tension. But the dejection still lingered, along with feelings of frustration, confusion, and worst of all, anger. It wasn't hard to understand why Sunbeam lost it and flew away in tears. They couldn't blame her. Zenjin was quite cruel to her. But then again, he was cruel to everybody else, so it wasn't hard to hate him.

Riko wasn't just sad for Sunbeam's sake. She wanted to help out, to make things better, to finally be able to contain someone's soul without causing blunders in the process. But despite her best efforts, she unknowingly made more blunders, and Marina called her out on it. Loudly and angrily. She had experienced this response many times before in different situations, but she never did get used to it. She was already shaken up from the battle, and Marina yelling at her, calling her names, and making it sound like she made those blunders on purpose did not make things better.

Even though Anzu stepped in, understood that she had good intentions, and clarified things, much to Riko's internal delight, Riko still didn't feel better. All she wanted to do was go home and relax, shake off the lingering sadness, get the yelling out of her head, and force the bad memories out of her brain. But they arrived at her house, where they were greeted by Marina's mother...who came out looking quite understandably worried.

"Marina!" With a shout, she glomped her daughter like she hadn't seen her in years. "Oh, Marina! I'm so glad you're safe! I saw what happened to the school on TV! I was just about to go and get you! Are you okay? You're not hurt are you?" Marina's mother asked hysterically, albeit relieved that her only daughter was safe.

"I'm fine, Mom," Marina replied in a low voice.

Soon, Marina's mother let go of her, but then caught sight of Hotaru, Riko, and Anzu. "Who are they?"

"These are...my friends," Marina replied softly.

"Your...friends…?" Her mother asked.

"Yeah. We fled the school when the craziness happened, and they wanted to go somewhere safe to cool down, so I offered to let them come here. Sorry," Marina confessed a little sadly. She expected her mother to get angry at her, to tell her not to have strangers come over. But much to her surprise, instead of getting angry, she looked like she won the lottery.

"Oh! No no no! Come on in! It's been a long while since we've had guests, so I don't mind at all! But do let your parents know that you're here. I don't want them getting worried. Oh! This is so wonderful, Mari-chan!" Marina's mother exclaimed when she let the girls in the house. "My goodness! You thought you'd never see the day in which you'd actually have friends and have them over! You must be so happy, Mari-chan! I know I sure am!" Marina's mother began gadding away like a chatterbox.

Marina couldn't help but be surprised by her mother's sudden change in behavior. But then again, Marina herself had always wanted friends, but never had any because people hated her due to her own actions or her father's crimes. Her mother knew this, and it always made her sad to see Marina so sad, lonely, and friendless.

"Would you like anything, girls? I have lots of snacks to pick from! Would you like anything to drink? Water? Juice? Soda? Orange juice?"

"Just glasses of water are fine. We're gonna go up to my room. Okay?" Marina told her.

"We're very grateful for your hospitality, and please pardon our unprecedented entrance," Hotaru told her politely and bowed in a refined manner.

"Uhh...aren't you in high school?" Marina's mother asked. "How do you know my daughter?"

"My school had a half day today, and I happened to be in the area when the commotion happened," Hotaru explained as calmly and lucidly as possible.

"She's friends with my brother," Riko piped in.

"Oh. I see," Marina's mother said.

The girls gathered in Marina's room. They all sat down in wherever they felt comfortable. Anzu sat on Marina's bed, taking care not to disturb some things she had on it. Hotaru, Riko, and Marina chose to sit on the floor.

"So...where do we start?" Riko asked.

"Can anyone explain to me what all of this weirdness is about?" Marina began, raising her hand like she's in school.

"We can explain everything, Marina-san," Starbeam piped in.

Starting from scratch, Starbeam told Marina and the other girls about Rozaniela and its inhabitants, why they created the planet, the Energia, Zenjin getting his hands on it, what he did to Rozaniela, Pretty Cure, and Soul Portals. It wasn't any different from what Sunbeam and Moonbeam told Riko. But once Starbeam explained the gist of it, Marina began to feel a little better. She lost the angry and confused look on her face.

"That definitely explains a lot. Thanks. But one quick question: what exactly does the word Rozaniela mean?" Marina told the fairies.

"Oh. We actually borrowed it from your human language. The word Rozaniela is actually a Polish word that translates to happiness or well-being. It was the Queen's idea. Sorry!" Moonbeam explained.

"Thieves," Anzu mused to herself in a low whisper.

"So...what's Zenjin's deal? Why's he going around stealing souls and turning them into monsters?" Marina asked.

"That part, we're still trying to figure out. We have no idea why he's doing what he's been doing, and we don't know what his motive is for even stealing the Energia in the first place," Moonbeam explained a little sadly.

"How did you fairies even meet Zenjin?" Hotaru asked curiously.

"You said something about him being rescued from an abusive home. Sunbeam said an evil woman was beating him?" Riko said.

"Oh, his original life on Earth was absolutely horrid," Starbeam explained. "We weren't there when the King and some of his denizens rescued him, but they've told us about it a great deal, and we saw them bring him onto Rozaniela. They found out about his existence about a few years ago, and when they discovered the absolutely terrible abuse he was going through, they decided to save him. It was risky, they said, as the rescue itself would give them away. But they went and did it anyway, knowing how badly he needed to be removed from that awful place. Oh, just telling you about what the poor child went through makes me want to cry! The poor child was so battered and so broken and so near death I'm still surprised they were even able to save him! The woman who raised him is an evil, despicable woman, from what the King told us. She beat him constantly…"

"Deprived him of food," Moonbeam piped in. The two fairies sudden began going back and forth in describing the horrific abuse that Zenjin had to endure on Earth.

"Forced him to sleep in a dog house…"

"Threw him through broken glass…"

"Called him names every single day…"

"Yelled at him every single day…"

"Humiliated him every chance she had…"

"Sat on him and beat him senseless until he couldn't breathe…"

"Made him eat his own vomit…"

"Deliberately made him do bad things for more pretext to abuse him…"

"I think we get the idea," Anzu said with a hand in the air, cutting the two fairies off, which made them finish talking.

"Jeez. That's just wrong on so many levels," Marina mused with her arms crossed.

"So your King and some friends rescued him. What happened after that?" Riko asked curiously, interested in knowing more.

"We brought him to Rozaniela so he can have a happy life. But from what we've seen, he had a very hard time adjusting, despite the love and affection the Queen and others showered on him," Moonbeam remembered seeing Zenjin sitting all alone in a field of flowers once. He just stared off into space, ignoring everything around him. "He never talked to anyone, he didn't go to school, he just sat in places and stared at everything listlessly. But the Queen figured he needed time to adjust before she considered sending him to school. She was afraid that if we forced it, we might unknowingly make things worse. She thought he just needed some time."

"So...what does all of this have to do with Sunbeam? Were she and Zenjin really...friends?" Anzu tried to ask this as politely as possible, but considering the fact that they heard Zenjin mercilessly rip Sunbeam's heart out and smash it to pieces, getting to hear how he really felt about her, she thought the word friends would be too inappropriate to use. But she couldn't think of anything better, so she went and used it. Moonbeam's long, purple and blue ears drooped down to the floor, looking just as sad as Anzu was.

"I wouldn't say they were actually friends, now that we really know how he feels about her. But when he first came to Rozaniela, Sunbeam would sneak out every chance she got to play with him. She wanted to be his first friend and give him everything that evil woman never gave him. He never did respond to her, but she kept on trying to interact with him. She really believed some kindness would get through to him, as it did so many others the Queen and King have saved. But as it turns out, nothing she or any of us have done worked," Starbeam explained sadly.

"Poor Sunbeam…" Riko mused dejectedly, her little heart going out to the sad orange fairy who flew away somewhere in tears. All Sunbeam wanted to do was be Zenjin's friend and make him happy, only to discover that he never liked her and that he was absolutely unwilling to be friends with her. From the way he talked to the sad orange fairy, he made it sound like Sunbeam was his mortal enemy, like she was a threat, just like the evil woman was to him so long ago.

How could Zenjin be so ungrateful, so cold, so merciless, so insensitive, so downright heartless as to not only reject someone's unrelenting kindness, but to tell them that they should never have been born, among other things? He really hurt Sunbeam's feelings and made her cry. There was no way Riko could forgive that, no matter what kind of life he had. Sunbeam deserved better than that.

"I brought some snacks and water," Marina's mother said as she brought in a plate of food and drinks. She gently placed it down on the floor so nothing on it would break or fall off.

"Thanks, Mom," Marina said as she took a glass and immediately gulped it down. Riko saw that on the tray are lots of crackers, little pretzels, and chocolate chip cookies. She and Moonbeam went for water and the cookies. Anzu and Starbeam grabbed some crackers, and Marina and Hotaru grabbed some pretzels.

"Man, that hit the spot," Anzu said as she finished eating her crackers and gulped down her glass of water. "I really needed that."

"Me too," Starbeam piped in.

"Oh! Before I forget, here," Hotaru said as she rummaged through her pocket and pulled out some pieces of paper. She handed them all to Riko, Anzu, and Marina. "This is my cell phone number. I've been meaning to give these to you, but I never got the chance until now. Hopefully now it'll be easier to contact each other when a Corrupt Sentinel attacks."

"Thanks, Hotaru-san!" Anzu said as she put the paper in her pocket.

"But we don't have cell phones," Riko said.

"My dad says he's gonna get me one soon in case of emergencies," Anzu piped in.

"Mine too," Marina said.

"At least now maintaining contact will be somewhat easier," Moonbeam said as she flew into Riko's tender arms.

"I'm gonna go call my parents," Riko said quietly as she stood up and left the room, unknowingly taking Moonbeam with her.

Riko quietly stepped out of Marina's room and went into the dining room to find Marina's mother sitting on one of the chairs, reading a kindle. "Oh! Hello there!" Marina's mother exclaimed with a smile, which made Riko blush and turn away.

"Hi," Riko replied sheepishly, knowing that it'd be rude to not respond, even though she'd much rather not do so.

"Do you like it here so far?"

"I dunno."

"Oh! I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Asagi Hatoko, Marina's mother. What's your name?"

"Ta-Ta-Ta-Tasogare...Riko…"

As soon as Marina's mother heard her name, her smile faded in an instant. "Oh...you're...I see. Then I should apologize. My daughter has developed a bad habit of picking on people, and I feel very bad about what she put you through. The school told me about it. I'm sorry she acted the way she did, and I don't condone it in any way."

"It's okay. I get picked on all the time, so I'm used to it by now," Riko replied sheepishly, not quite sure of how to respond to that question. She just went with what her gut told her to say.

"It's just...Marina's never had any friends because of what her father did, and it always made me sad to see her so lonely, even more so when she started getting into fights and bullying people as a way of coping with all the hatred. I hope you at least understand," Hatoko explained as kindly as she could.

"I get it. She said sorry to me, so it's fine. Where's your phone?" Riko said.

"Right on the counter," Hatoko replied, pointing to the counter. "By the way, that's a cute plushie you have."

"Thanks," Riko said when she saw the silver phone on the counter. She picked it up, dialed her phone number, and waited for an answer. After a couple rings, someone answered on the other line.

"_Hello? Tasogare residence,"_ It's Saki's voice.

"Hi, Mom. It's Riko," She said.

"_Riko?! Oh, thank goodness! I heard about what happened to the school. I went to find you but you weren't there! Where are you now?"_ Saki exclaimed worriedly.

"At a friend's house. She invited us there to cool down," Riko replied shyly.

"_What's the address?"_ Saki asked.

"Uh…" She didn't know. But Hatoko would know. She could ask her. "Hang on a sec," Riko said as she turned toward Hatoko. "Asagi-san? What's this house's address?"

"It's 2318 Himura Avenue," Hatoko replied.

"2318 Himura Avenue. It's a blue and white house. It's got the name tag Asagi on it," Riko told her worried but relieved mother casually.

"_Himura...Avenue...Asagi...got it! That's not far from here, so I'll pick you up right now. Okay? Thanks for calling, Riko. Just stay put, okay? I'll be there as soon as I can. Bye!"_ Saki said, then hung up. Riko hung up the phone as well. She then went into a little hallway, then stopped in her tracks.

"What's wrong, Riko-chan?" Moonbeam asked, noticing that Riko's looking like she's about to cry.

"I messed up again. Asagi yelled at me, just like everybody does when I mess up. I'm sick of it!" Riko whimpered sadly.

"Don't be sad, Riko-chan. Everybody messes up. Besides, you did your best. I do agree that Marina-san shouldn't have yelled at you, though. But I'm sure she's sorry, and we can do better next time," Moonbeam explained.

"No. You don't get it. I never get better at anything, and everyone knows it. Anything I do wrong, I always get yelled at. Always! People yell at me even when I don't even do anything at all! I'm so sick of getting yelled at all the time!" Riko snapped, with some tears trickling out.

'_She's taking it a lot more personally than I imagined,'_ Moonbeam thought curiously. It broke her heart to see Riko looking sad, and it was already heart wrenching to see her own sister be sadder than she ever was before. "Well, you at least put the man's soul back in his Soul Portal. That's good, right? If you ever want to talk or vent, I'm more than willing to listen and help out, even though I might not be able to do much," She told her with a smile.

This made Riko smile a bit as she used one of her bare arms to wipe her tears away. "At least you understand me. I'd really like that."

"Anzu-chan understands too. She stopped Marina from yelling at you more."

"Yeah. Good point."

She was about to turn around and go back until she stopped to find Marina standing at the end of the hall, looking rather guilty and rueful. "Hey," Marina whispered.

"Hey," Riko whispered back.

"Look, I'm...sorry for snapping at you earlier. That was stupid of me," Marina told her apologetically, her golden eyes shaking a little.

Riko kept on looking down, away from Marina's remorseful eyes. "It's fine. I mess up all the time, so I'm used to it," Riko replied weakly.

"I know. I have trouble keeping my anger in check, and I tend to question people's motives a lot. My mom's signed me up for anger management classes, so hopefully it'll help. If I ever do it again, try not to take it personally. 'Kay?" Marina told her as she rubbed part of her frizzy orange hair with her hand.

Riko nodded quietly. "Considering what you went through, I can sorta understand why, Asagi-san."

"Uh...you _can_ call me Marina, y'know. I want us to be friends, so if you wanna call me by my first name, it's okay. Do you mind if I use yours, too?" Marina told her.

"Sure. I don't mind," Riko murmured shyly. Moonbeam could see the sad look still lingering, suspecting that Riko isn't feeling any better and not feeling very convinced.

_Knock knock_

"Coming!" When she heard the knock on the door, Hatoko rushed to the door and opened it to find Saki at the door.

"Hello there. Is Tasogare Riko here?" Saki asked politely. Before Hatoko could call out, Riko came herself.

"Hi, Mom," Riko said.

"Ready to go, sweetie?" Saki asked.

"Yeah. But can I show you someone?" Riko said, then adding in a question of her own.

"Sure," Saki said.

Riko ran back to Marina's room, grabbed a confused Anzu by the hand, dragged her to the front door, and stopped. "Mom, this is Chino Anzu, my friend. An-chan, this is my mom, Saki."

A smile appeared on Saki's face as soon as she saw the blonde haired, bespectacled girl. Riko didn't see, as she was too focused on Moonbeam. "It's nice to meet you, Chino-san. Riko's told me so much about you," Saki told her as she shook Anzu's hand.

"Thanks. Nice to meet you, too. Sorry for all this weirdness," Anzu replied with a smile of her own.

"You ought to come over sometime. We'd love to have you," Saki told her, which made Anzu smile even more. It even made Riko and Moonbeam smile.

"Thanks for watching Riko for me, Asagi-san. Sorry for the trouble," Saki told Hatoko.

"It's no problem at all. Feel free to have her come over sometime!" Hatoko exclaimed.

Soon, Saki, Riko, and Moonbeam got into the car and left the Asagi house. But as they were on the ride home, Riko couldn't help but remember something that popped into her head like a party popper. "Shouldn't we be looking for Sunbeam?" Riko whispered quietly.

"Sunbeam tends to be snippy when she's sad, so we're better off leaving her alone. She'll come back when she's feeling better," Moonbeam explained in a whisper so Saki wouldn't hear her.

"Anzu-chan seems like a nice girl," Saki said.

"She is. We sit at lunch together, along with someone else," Riko said.

Soon, they made it home safe and sound. Saki and Riko did end up getting greeted by a very happy and energetic Yumiko, who jumped on them, begged for food with her big puppy eyes, and followed them around like a baby chick. After that, Riko and Moonbeam went back to Riko's room, hopefully to finally be able to calm down and relax after all the craziness that happened. Riko herself is just happy to be back in her room. But as soon as they walked right on, both of their hypersensitive ears picked up on a sound they really didn't want to hear.

Sniveling. Sobbing. Crying.

One look in her big stuffed animal pile confirmed the source of it: Sunbeam. She was covering her face with her stubby little orange arms, but everyone could see the huge globs of tears streaming down her chubby cheeks and the dark marks on some of Riko's stuffed animals. Her ears bobbed up and down with her crying, but they still drooped, limp like wet towels being hung outside to dry.

Riko was about to ask Sunbeam why she came here of all places, but she felt a gentle press on her hand. She looked down to find one of Moonbeam's hands on her own. Moonbeam looked at her with a pleading look and gently shook her head. Riko actually made eye contact this time, and she saw the silent message in Moonbeam's sterling silver eyes: it's best to let Sunbeam cry for a while. She'll stop. Plus, if what Moonbeam said is true about Sunbeam getting snippy when she's sad, Riko didn't want to risk getting yelled at again for her good intentions, so she decided to leave the sad orange fairy alone.

But she didn't want to leave without saying something. "Sunbeam? If you need anything, let me and Moonbeam know. Okay? I'll bring some dinner for you when it's ready," Riko whispered as soft as she could, hoping not to scare her. Sunbeam nodded without turning to look at Riko. But the short haired girl didn't mind. The nod was enough, so she put Moonbeam down on her bed and went downstairs to work on some homework before dinner, leaving the two sisters alone together. Moonbeam said nothing as she picked out a book and read it in silence while Sunbeam sat within Riko's mountain of stuffed animal and cried some more. Moonbeam never saw Sunbeam cry this much before. Oh, how she yearned to comfort her older sister so! But she also didn't want to risk getting yelled at, so she read one of Riko's books.

However, unbeknownst to everyone, Sunbeam wasn't just crying.

(flashback)

_Sunbeam and other fairies, none of which were her sisters, played in a field full of newly blossoming flowers in all colors of the rainbows. The fairies zipped around happily, laughing and cheering and chasing each other like annoying house flies._

_The sky above them was an absolutely stunning shade of pale pink, like the frail foliage of cherry blossoms, with a radiant sun spreading its golden rays down below, giving warmth and light to all of Rozaniela's inhabitants. The trees that surrounded them had foliage in very strange colors, like dark blue, light blue, teal, violet purple, narcissus white, and cotton candy pink. No, these weren't flowers, they were actual leaves in unnatural colors. But the fairies didn't find their unnatural foliage colors to be odd at all._

"_Bet you can't catch me!" Sunbeam teased as she zipped happily and exuberantly around some trees like a housefly trying to find some nectar to drink._

"_Come back here, Sunbeam!" One pale green fairy exclaimed in a young, boyish voice as he and two others chased after her. Once Sunbeam found herself in another field, she saw that something was there. But it wasn't just something. It was someone. She stopped in her tracks to get a better look._

_It was a boy. A human boy. Just about twenty feet away from her, sitting on the flower garden, looking down at what he's sitting on rather listlessly. He looked to be about eight or so years old. All she could see of him was his long, dark, crimson red hair that went down to his neck, making him look like a girl if one were not observant enough. One of his arms was in a hard, snow white cast, from shoulder to palm, completely covered, leaving only his fingers mobile. His right ankle was wrapped in bandages, going up to his knee, with the rest of it covered with one half of a set of black shoes. He was wearing a plain dark blue T-shirt and brown shorts. Parts of his face had gauze taped to it. His left eye was covered with a white eye patch._

"_Sunbeam!" The pale green fairy finally caught up with Sunbeam, with a pink and blue fairy and a red and white fairy trailing behind. "What'cha lookin' at, Sunny?" The pale green fairy asked curiously._

"_Who's that human?" Sunbeam asked, pointing to the boy staring down at the flowers listlessly._

"_Him? That's the boy the King and some of his denizens saved from some evil woman about two weeks ago. He said he's calling himself Zenjin," The pale green fairy explained._

"_He looks so sad. Poor thing," The pink and blue fairy said in a sweet voice, feeling pity for the boy._

"_I wish the King punished whoever hurt him. They really deserve it!" The red and white fairy exclaimed, throwing some punches in the air._

"_How old is he?" Sunbeam asked._

"_From what I heard, he's ten," The pink and blue fairy told her._

"_Ehhh?!" Sunbeam yelped, surprised. "He's ten?! But he looks so much younger!"_

"_Shh! You'll scare him, Sunny!" The pale green fairy shushed, prompting Sunbeam to shut her mouth. But when they turned to glance at him again, they noticed he didn't move a muscle. He just continued to stare down at the flowers listlessly, like he didn't hear anything the quartet of fairies said at all._

"_Hey! Here's an idea! How about we play with him? It'll be so much fun!" Sunbeam suggested cheerfully._

"_I dunno. He hasn't played with anyone since he came here. He just ignores everyone and sits around and stares at everything. To be honest, he kind of scares me a little," The pink and blue fairy told her, sounding unsure._

"_My mom says you shouldn't talk bad about people behind their back. It's not nice," Sunbeam piped in._

"_That's true," The green fairy agreed._

"_Who knows? Maybe he's really nice and sweet! We won't know until we talk to him! If you don't want to, that's okay," Sunbeam exclaimed._

"_Sure. It's okay. You can go play with him. But try not to be too long, though. We have at least fifteen more minutes until recess is over," The red and white fairy told her._

"_Yay! Thanks!" Sunbeam exclaimed as she zipped away from her three fairy friends and toward Zenjin. Once she got close, however, she stopped and floated back down on the flowers so as to not scare him. _

_She walked in front of him to find that one of his eyes was a neutral dark brown color, like chocolate, but it had absolutely no sign of life in it whatsoever. It was like all the light and life had been sucked right out of him. His other eye was covered with a white eye patch. His skin was pale and white like snow. He didn't seem to notice the fairy in front of him. Sunbeam couldn't help but agree with her friend that his listless state scared her a little bit, but she tried not to let it get to her._

"_Hello," Sunbeam told him cheerfully but softly, so she wouldn't scare him. No response. Nothing wrong with that. She kept going. "I'm Sunbeam! You're Zenjin, right? Nice to meet you," She said again. No response again._

"_You're gonna love Rozaniela. It's super pretty, there's castles everywhere, there's lots of animals here, and everyone here is nice to each other! Well, not everybody, but for the most part everyone's nice. Then again, the King and Queen did make the planet so they could give people who've been through bad stuff a second chance at life, so I guess that's a given," Sunbeam told him. Again, no response. She couldn't help but find his silence rather unsettling._

"_So what do you like to do? Do you have any games you like playing?" Sunbeam asked. No response. "My friends and I like playing tag and hide and seek. We also like playing board games like Fairy's Frenzy, Rozanielan Rhapsody, Jenga, Chutes and Ladders, Sorry, Candyland, Scrabble, and Leap Frog's Pond. Oh! Do you like card games? I often play Go Fish with my parents and sisters. I'm not really good at ones like Crazy Eights or Rummy. Starbeam is, though! She adores card games when she's not holed up in a book! Oh! Here's an idea! Tomorrow I'll bring my deck of cards so we can play! Or my Jenga box so we can play that! I'd love to teach you how to play Fairy's Frenzy, though. It's so much fun!"_

_Not one response came out of the lifeless looking boy. Not even any muscle movement. He sat as still as a mannequin the entire time. But Sunbeam found that she didn't mind. She was going to talk to him some more until a voice stopped her from doing so. "Zenjin!"_

_Much to Sunbeam's surprise, Zenjin finally responded by turning his head around. Sunbeam could see his eyes widen a little, but not to a scared or fearful degree. Sunbeam looked past Zenjin to see a man walking toward them. He looked to be in his mid to late twenties, with long, shimmering, green hair cascading down to his lower back, complete with a little tiny beard on his face. His eyes were a lively shade of cherry red, looking quite vibrant and illustrious, just like his extravagant clothing._

_His clothes looked like they were ripped right out of the 18th century: a crimson coat over a crimson shirt, all embroidered with shining gold lace on the corners, from the edges of the pockets all the way to his collar. Even the buttons on his coat are gold. He also wore matching crimson pants that only went down to his knees, with four black buttons on each side of them, going up from his pant legs vertically. He also wore very tall, snow white socks coupled with moccasins that had lots of orange and sky blue patterns sewn on them, like they really were made by real Native Americans. A curly white lace ruffle hung from the man's collar, matching the ruffles that came out of the cuffs on his sleeves._

"_Hello, Zenjin!" The green haired, weirdly dressed man said with a suave, polite voice. He kneeled before the listless boy like it was the most normal thing in the world. But when he opened his eyes, he noticed Sunbeam there. "I see you've made a new friend. Thanks for keeping him company, little one. He has a habit of coming here and staring into space all by himself," The green haired man told her kindly._

"_You're welcome. All I've done is talk to him though. He hasn't talked to me yet. But can I play with him whenever I have recess?" Sunbeam told him sweetly, which made him smile some more._

"_That'll depend on whether he wants to play with anyone or not, since he hasn't socialized with anyone yet. You must understand he's been through quite a horrible time," The green haired man said with a gentle smile._

"_Is he gonna be okay?" Sunbeam asked innocently._

"_We'll see. Come along now, Zenjin. Beileag is waiting for us," The green haired man said as he extended his hand out to Zenjin. For the very first time, Sunbeam saw Zenjin pull up his arm, reach out to the man's palm, and allowed it to be swallowed by one of the green haired man's big hands. Hand in hand, the two walked away. But Sunbeam wasn't done yet._

"_I'll come play with you again tomorrow, Zenjin! I'd love for us to be friends! See ya!" Sunbeam called out. Again, Zenjin didn't respond, but she didn't mind. Sunbeam began feeling giddy inside and flew back to school with a light heart. She made a new friend! One who's human, too! It was one of the most wonderful feelings in the world._

_In the weeks that went by, she found herself playing with Zenjin every chance she got. She talked to him, told him stories, and read books to him. The only problem was that he never talked back to her or responded to anything she did. He just sat there in silence, staring at her like she was never there. Sunbeam assumed he was still sad from the abuse he had to endure before coming to Rozaniela. But she didn't think he was incapable of interaction with anyone. She saw him respond to the green haired man. Who's to say he won't eventually respond to her? _

_About two weeks or so after their first meeting, Sunbeam came to their fairy school one day with a big box wrapped in a plum blossom themed _furoshiki(1)_. At lunch time, she unwrapped the purple furoshiki and opened the maroon box to reveal lots of little cupcakes, all with lime green frosting dappled on them with little chocolate chips on top._

"_Wow! These look good!" The green fairy exclaimed._

"_Where'd you buy these, Sunny?" The red and white fairy asked curiously._

"_I didn't. I made these myself!" Sunbeam confessed with a smile._

"_You cooked these all by yourself?" The pink and blue fairy asked, surprised._

"_Yep! I practiced lots and lots, and it was really hard, but I finally got them to come out well! Wanna try one? They're super duper good!" Sunbeam told them. Curiously, the red and white fairy took a cupcake, removed the aluminum foil on the bottom, and bit off a good chunk of the lime green frosting, the chocolate chip going down his throat with it._

"_Hey! These ARE good!" The red and white fairy exclaimed happily, his eyes glowing with joy._

"_You like it, Flicker? Thanks!" Sunbeam exclaimed._

_The green and pink fairies each took a cupcake and took some bites out of it as well. Their faces lit up when they finished eating their pieces. "Wow! These are great, Sunny!" The green fairy exclaimed._

"_You should make these more often!" The pink fairy said._

"_Thanks, Patch and Mimosa!" Sunbeam exclaimed._

"_Hm? How come there's a few more? You saving them for someone else?" Mimosa asked curiously when she noticed there's a couple more cupcakes in the box even though there's enough for Sunbeam, Flicker, Mimosa, and Patch._

_Flicker rolled his eyes. "I think I know who you're gonna give the rest of those cupcakes to," Flicker said._

_Sunbeam flashed a sheepish but mischievous looking smile and said no more. The fairies ate the lime green cupcakes Sunbeam made and the rest of their lunch. After that, recess came along and everyone played...except for Sunbeam, who immediately took the last of her cupcakes and dashed into the part of the flower bed where the green haired guy said Zenjin often goes to, hoping he'll be there again. _

_Happily enough, Zenjin was there again, acting the same way he's done before. But this time, his eye patch was gone, and the bandages on his leg have been removed. His entire arm was still in a cast, though._

"_Zenjin-san!" Sunbeam called out as she fluttered toward the still emotionless, insouciant boy and descended before him, unwrapping the furoshiki and opening the box to show him the two remaining cupcakes. "I made cupcakes! Do you want to try one?" Sunbeam asked politely, her face radiant with expectation._

_Like all of the other times, Zenjin showed absolutely no response, causing Sunbeam's ears to droop a bit. "Well, if you don't want any, that's okay. I can still make lots more, since I finally mastered the recipe," Sunbeam told him. But she was quite oblivious to something as she talked, and all it took was a movement of a hand to see it._

_Zenjin's hand. It was moving toward the box. His arm and hand were trembling, but he grabbed one of the cupcakes, pulled the aluminum foil off of the bottom part, threw it next to him, and took a rather big bite out of the cupcake, swallowing quite a good chunk of the lime green frosting and the chocolate chip on top. Sunbeam couldn't believe her eyes. _

_After all this time, he finally responded to something she did, even if it wasn't with words! As she ruminated and found herself floating on a cloud of happiness, Zenjin consumed the entire cupcake, with traces of lime green frosting dappled around his mouth and cheeks._

_Sunbeam couldn't help but giggle. "Heehee. You've got frosting on your face," Sunbeam told him sweetly as she pointed to her face. Silently, Zenjin poked the icing on his face, scooped it onto his fingers, and sucked on them._

"_Do you like it?" Sunbeam asked._

_Zenjin didn't say anything, like expected. Sunbeam didn't mind at all. She's used to it by now, and she knew better than to force it. But yet another surprise appeared before her big blue eyes. _

_Zenjin flashed a small smile. _

_And nodded in gratitude despite his eyes still looking more lifeless than a mannequin._

_Just seeing these little gestures made Sunbeam squeal like a happy Elvis fangirl, her plump ears shot into the air and her blue eyes shone brighter than the starry sky._

"_Yaaay! I'm sooooo happy you like it! Thank you thank you thank you!" Without knowing it, Sunbeam found herself flying into Zenjin's chest and nuzzling his shirt like a happy puppy, also not cognizant of the fact that his previously listless eyes grew a little big with surprise. _

_But that didn't matter to Sunbeam. She was just happy her efforts to befriend him paid off, even the tiniest little bit, even if it wasn't what she expected. She didn't mind at all. If he's happy, then she's happy. He liked her cupcakes. He smiled and nodded in gratitude, albeit rather slowly. This made her the happiest fairy alive._

(end flashback)

But that was long ago. Now, instead of being the happiest, most joyous, most cheerful, most loving, most enlightened fairy alive, Sunbeam was now the saddest, most heartbroken fairy in the world.

She cried harder. Instead of returning her kindness, Zenjin cruelly stomped on her heart and crushed it beyond all repair just with his venomous words and true feelings alone. There was absolutely no way Sunbeam would ever forgive the ungrateful brat for treating her like garbage. But what could she do? Zenjin had the Energia inside of him, so he could do whatever he wanted. Sunbeam was just a little fairy who shoots beams of light and shape shifts a little, but that's it.

"Sunbeam? Here's dinner," Riko whispered in a soft voice as she gently placed a little plate of food next to the pile of stuffed animals she's crying in. It had been quite a while, but Sunbeam found herself lucid enough to look at the food: some alfredo, chicken, and broccoli. She then looked up at Riko with the saddest face the black haired girl ever saw.

"Riko-chan…" Sunbeam blubbered like a baby. She then dashed into Riko's shirt. "I want a hug! Can I please hug you?! I wanna cry on you!" Sunbeam wailed. Before Riko could answer, Sunbeam already began wailing into her chest. Riko didn't cover her ears, nor did she reject Sunbeam's desperate plea. How could she? That'd be rude and inconsiderate of her.

She couldn't blame Sunbeam for being so sad. All she wanted was to be nice to someone who went through some bad things, to give him some kindness and happiness, things he never received, only to be brutally rejected in the worst ways possible. With a sad smile, Riko held the crying fairy close and stroke her orange fur while squeezing her as gently as she wanted. Sunbeam needed a shoulder to cry on, someone to comfort her. Riko didn't mind doing this, but it broke her heart to see poor Sunbeam so sad.

After a few more minutes of crying into Riko's shirt, Sunbeam looked up at her, eyes still shimmering with tears begging to break right out. "Thank you, Riko-chan. At least you're nice to me. I'm sorry for being mean when we first met," Sunbeam blubbered.

"I know. I'm used to people being mean to me, so it's okay," Riko told her gently.

"Huh?" Sunbeam murmured. "You say you're used to it. What does that mean? Have people been mean to you a lot?"

Riko nodded. "Yep. All my life, and it's still going on. People hate me because I'm weird and stupid and not normal like they want me to be, and I mess up at stuff and make things worse when I don't mean to. I always get yelled at, even when I'm trying to be nice," Riko told her.

"That's stupid! You're new at the whole Pretty Cure thing! We don't expect you to be perfect! Not at all! I know you do your best, and you always have good intentions, so it's okay! Besides, even if you are careful, Zenjin doesn't care and just wants to blow everything up by making those monsters," Sunbeam exclaimed forcefully.

"It's not just the whole Pretty Cure thing. I get yelled at just for...being around, or doing anything. You see how my little sister yells at me all the time," Riko told her.

"That's stupid, too! You're not bad! If you were bad, then you wouldn't be helping us! You wouldn't have taken us in or patched us up! Better yet, you wouldn't even be here comforting me when I need it the most!" Sunbeam piped in.

"Good point," Riko murmured shyly.

"Here's an idea! If anyone's being mean to you or calling you names or stuff like that, you tell me and I'll be ever so glad to give them some good ol' beatdowns!" Sunbeam exclaimed cheerfully as she threw some punches in the air for good measure.

Riko giggled. "Thanks. I'd like that. At least you and Moonbeam like me for who I am and don't misunderstand my intentions."

"Why would we? The Queen said that people only become Pretty Cures if they have good hearts and are willing to help others! But I don't know if that's the only condition, though," Sunbeam piped in.

"You'd better eat dinner. I don't want you to go hungry," Riko told her.

A rumbling sound echoed in the room, and it came right from Sunbeam's stomach. She blushed and decided to eat. "I am getting hungry, so thanks for the food!" Sunbeam said politely before chomping down like a hungry bear. She's had a rough day, so Riko thought she deserved a good meal to fill her tiny, pudgy little belly, even though she knew it wouldn't fill up her broken heart.

"I finished mine already," Moonbeam piped in.

"Oh! Do you have any orange juice by any chance?" Sunbeam asked after she ate some noodles.

"We do, but Dad's the only one who drinks it. I don't like it," Riko said. "Why? You want some?"

"Yes please!" Sunbeam said.

"Okay. I'll go get some," Riko said. She left the room, got a plastic cup, opened the orange juice carton, poured a little bit in, closed it back up, put it back, and slowly ambled back to her room so she wouldn't spill any. "Here ya go."

"Thanks, Riko-chan!" Sunbeam said as she ate some broccoli. After that, she took the plastic cup and drank up all the orange juice in one gulp. Riko could tell she's starting to look a little better than she was half an hour ago. She felt happy that she finally did something right without getting yelled at for once. Sunbeam really needed it after what Zenjin put her through.

Once they finished, Riko and the fairies played together again like they've done for the past week. All the playing and socializing did a number on them, but they enjoyed it nonetheless. Moonbeam could tell that the pieces of Sunbeam's broken heart began to very slowly put themselves back together, little by little. Once night fell, they went right to sleep.

Soon, Monday night turned into Tuesday morning. Much to Riko's surprise, she still had to go to school despite the brouhaha that happened yesterday. It turns out only the science room is off limits until it's repaired, so the kids still have to come to school like usual. They were not happy about it. Some of them even complained quite loudly, but they knew complaining wouldn't solve anything, so they just dredged through the school day.

School was normal, like usual, other than the fact that Riko invited Marina to sit at their lunch table again, much to Kyoya's surprise. But he could tell she was beginning to turn over a new leaf, so he decided to not make a big fuss about it.

Riko did notice that Fukiko, the girl Kyoya doesn't seem to like for some reason who got trapped in the debris, actually came to school. Her leg was in bandages, not a cast, so it didn't look like her injury was as serious as anyone thought. But Fukiko still watched them from time to time, her hazel eyes curious as to what they were chatting about, like she wanted to join them but was debating whether she should or not. Riko thought about inviting her, but she didn't know anything about her, especially not what she liked or disliked. Not only that, Kyoya, from the way he acted when Anzu brought her up last time, didn't seem too keen on having anything to do with her, so she decided against it and went about the rest of the day.

Since the science room was off limits until it's repaired, which the kids could tell would most likely take a while since it was covered with yellow _DO NOT CROSS_ signs, Mr. Amane thought it'd be a good idea to have class outside on the blacktop to learn about how the sun helps plants grow and thrive. Although the kids were happy about it, they did wish they could play around and do whatever they wanted. Funnily enough, Riko found herself next to Fukiko, who shared her class to begin with, and even sat at the same table, but they hardly ever interacted. Not until now, that is.

"Hey. You're Tasogare, right?" Fukiko whispered suddenly.

"Huh?" Riko couldn't help but feel a little surprised and perplexed by Fukiko being next to her. "Uhh...yeah. I am."

"That's a cute shirt," Fukiko whispered. Confused, Riko looked down at her short sleeved white shirt with five rows of little tiny ruffles going down from the top vertically.

"You mean this? Thanks," Riko replied shyly. "My mom got it for me," Then she noticed Fukiko's bandaged leg. "Does your leg hurt? You sure were stuck in there good."

"Yeah. It did like you wouldn't believe. But it's not broken, thank goodness for that, and it feels much better than before. I'm just glad Amane-sensei helped me when he did," Fukiko explained quietly, then noticed a little doodle in one of Riko's notebooks. A little round cat face with ears and a tail with dot eyes and a little 3-shaped mouth. "Aww, that's so cute! You like drawing?"

"Yes. I do," Riko replied shyly. _'We're in the middle of class! I know you wanna talk, but we need to listen to the teacher or we'll get in trouble, and could you scooch back a little?'_ Riko thought. She really wanted to say this, but she didn't want to get in trouble with Mr. Amane.

"By the way, you're friends with Mitomo-kun, right?"

"Yes," Riko whispered.

"You're not freaked out by his being in a wheelchair?"

Riko didn't like what that question implicated. "No. Do I need to be?" Riko whispered back.

"No, but-"

"Dounowaki!" Mr. Amane suddenly exclaimed, causing the brown haired girl to go, "Eep!" in surprise, drawing her attention back to him.

"Yes?"

"It's good you like chatting with your friends and all, but would you be so kind as to save it for after class? The lesson is still going on," Mr. Amane told her gently but sternly. Some kids laughed a bit.

Fukiko closed her eyes and let her shoulders slump. "Yes, sir."

Riko exhaled a sigh of relief, happy that Mr. Amane saved her from more of her chattering, well intentioned as it was. She continued to take notes like she usually does, throwing in the occasional doodle here and there.

But something about one of her questions didn't sit right with Riko. _"You're not freaked out by his being in a wheelchair?"_ Riko didn't like how it sounded. Was she implying that she doesn't like Kyoya BECAUSE he's in a wheelchair? If she was, Riko could understand Kyoya not liking her. But it didn't sound like she asked it in a mean or condescending way. It sounded more curious than malicious. Soon, class went on like usual, and so did the rest of the school day. Finally, school ended, and Saki came to pick her and Rina up. But they didn't go home right away.

"Awww! We have to go food shopping with you?!" Rina whined petulantly once Saki told her.

"Yes, girls. Sorry you have to come with me right after school. Arinao's at work and I had too much to do today, so I figure we might as well do it now," Saki told her.

Riko didn't seem to mind at all, though she did wish Saki told her in advance so she could tell Moonbeam and Sunbeam in advance so they wouldn't worry. But then again, they're probably out searching for their sister, so she didn't think it to be that big a deal. Not only that, she actually liked going food shopping with her mom, looking for whatever they needed in the aisles, listening to the music that played over the intercoms, pushing the rusty silver shopping carts around, and looking at everything. But there is one problem, however.

"Why does Riko have to come?! Can't she stay home?! She's just gonna ruin everything like she always does whenever we go out!" Rina complained loudly for all to hear.

'You're_ the one who ruins everything whenever we go out by shouting at me all the time!'_ Riko snapped in her head, trying desperately to not say it and make things worse.

"Watch the attitude, missy! I don't want you acting like that while we're out, and I definitely don't want you two arguing or fighting. Is that clear?" Saki scolded sternly.

With a pout, Rina kept her mouth shut. Riko rolled her eyes and looked out the window to stare at the scenery, but not before hearing a whisper. "You better not cry or play pretend or be weird and stupid, 'cause everybody's gonna stare at us!" Rina whispered, but Riko ignored her, much to the petulant little seven year old's chagrin.

For the most part, the shopping trip went by just fine. Saki and the girls got some necessities they needed, like toilet paper, napkins, paper towels, carrots, broccoli, bananas, apples, crescent rolls, strawberry and vanilla cream flavored yogurt (Riko likes vanilla cream, Rina likes strawberry), bags of dinner, microwavable soups, spinach, green beans, fruit flavored popsicles, crackers, chicken, eggs, milk, and coffee cream. In one aisle, Riko went to grab a jar of peanut butter when a jar next to it fell off of the shelf and rolled on the floor. Riko caught it in the nick of time.

"Hey! Don't knock stuff over! You'll break it!" Rina yelled for all to hear, causing people to turn around and take some glances. Nothing malicious or pitying, just curious as to what the yelling was about. "Mom! Riko knocked over a peanut butter jar!"

"Rina! Use your inside voice," Saki whispered as Riko put the peanut butter jar in the shopping cart, unfazed by Rina's acting out. "It's in a jar. Plastic jars don't break. Don't yell or people will stare!"

"But she always knocks stuff over, and people stare anyway!" Rina snapped back.

"Don't take that attitude with me, missy! If you yell and call your sister names again, you won't get the new Barbie dollhouse or watch any TV for the rest of the night. Do you understand?" Saki whispered sternly.

Rina pouted and kept her mouth shut after that. But she started talking again when they passed the snack aisle, full of bags of potato chips, cheese curls, any kind of junk food that could be put in a bag. Rina immediately grabbed a big bag of orange cheese curls. "Mom! Can we get this please?" Rina asked.

"No, Rina. We're not getting any more junk food in the house. It's bad for you. Now put it back where you found it," Saki told her calmly but firmly, not wanting to give in to Rina's demands and change in demeanor. Rina pouted again and angrily threw the bag back on the shelf. Soon, it was time to pay for the food. Saki, Riko, and Rina found a line that didn't seem very long, as only one person was there who just put his food on the processor. The cashier checked in everything while someone else put the food in the bags.

Riko had been used to seeing this for about a month now, but what she noticed about the bagger is that she didn't look like everyone else. Her pale blonde hair was perfectly straight, went down to her shoulders, and looked a little stringy. Her head was a lot rounder than usual, her eyes were small, almond shaped, and closer to her nose than usual despite being hidden by a pair of small, round glasses, and she certainly looked a little on the plump side. But the woman looked quite cheerful and merry, packing the groceries of the gruff male customer like she enjoyed it.

'_Does she have Down Syndrome?'_ Riko thought to herself innocently. She wanted to ask, but she knew it'd be rude, inappropriate, and insensitive to do so, and it was bad enough she got yelled at for everything else she did, so she decided against it. She couldn't help but wonder though. There weren't any problems, despite the line going a little slow.

Unfortunately, a problem did arise.

"Come on! Can't you go any faster?!" A gruff male customer with a little beard suddenly shouted out of nowhere, making everyone but the bagging lady gasp. The lady bagging his groceries didn't seem to notice. Or maybe she acted like she didn't notice. She was just focused on bagging his groceries as carefully as she could, taking care not to crush the eggs.

The angry bearded man grabbed a bag and began putting groceries in myself. "See how I do it? I can do it just fine!" The bearded man yelled. Riko covered her ears, not liking how loud he's being.

"Would you keep it down, please?" The cashier said as the blonde lady put more groceries in his bag.

"Ugh! I don't have time for this! I have a meeting to go to right after this!" The man grumbled to himself in a low voice. He suddenly turned to Saki. "Can you believe they actually hire these people?"

Out of nowhere, Saki suddenly slammed her hand on the side of the counter, her eyes aglow with a very appalled and angry gleam, causing Riko to squeeze her hands onto her ears. Now Saki's the one who's angry. Even Rina couldn't help but stare in bewilderment. "Y'know, I'd appreciate it if you didn't talk like that in front of me, my kids, or the nice lady packing your groceries! She's doing just fine, no thanks to you!" Saki snapped like she wanted to deck the guy despite how gruff and tough he looks.

"Come on! Get outta my face, lady!" The gruff man snapped, cowed by her sudden change in temper.

"I'll get out of your face if you stop being an idiot! People with disabilities have feelings, y'know?! Just like you and me and everyone else here, and here you go acting like you're the big boss around here! I'm not gonna sit here and let you talk like that to this woman the way you're doing, because if anything, _you're_ the one with the problem, not her!" Saki yelled, the fire in her heart still blazing passionately.

"You tell'em, woman!" One customer yelled from afar.

"If you have a problem, you'd better get out if you know what's good for you, because you do NOT want to cross this mother!" Saki snapped as she wagged her finger at the gruff man like he was an unruly child she's trying to discipline.

"Okay okay! Fine! Jeez, can't I just get my groceries already?" The man said once the receipt got printed out of the cash register. After that, he got his groceries and walked right out gruffly pushing his shopping cart, obviously looking very perturbed.

Saki's angry expression immediately faded, and she looked at the woman with soft hearted concern. "You alright, miss? Sorry I had to get so loud. You're doing just fine," Saki told her kindly.

The woman smiled. "Ish okay. Thanks. I just ignore people like him. I get talk like that sometimes, but I dun let it bother me," The woman told him in a nice but slightly slurred voice, but not so slurred that nobody can understand what she was saying.

"You're welcome. Girls? After this, we're going to see the store manager and tell him about this," Saki said once the cashier began processing her groceries.

"What?! But I wanna go home!" Rina complained. Saki paid her no heed. Soon, one the groceries were processed, she asked the cashier where the store manager is, and she directed them to a little room not far from the exit. Once they got there, they saw the man in charge, and Saki told him about the incident. The man smiled when she finished.

"Thanks for reporting this, ma'am. If the man ever comes back, we'll make sure he doesn't insult Shiratori-san again," The manager told her kindly.

"It just broke my heart to see him pick on her like that. I don't want my kids growing up into people like him, and they saw the whole thing. I felt I had to intervene," Saki told him.

"We're glad you did. Not very many people report these kinds of incidents to us, so it's good that you did. Izumi-chan's one of our best employees, and we love her very much. She's worked hard to get where she is now. Again, thanks for reporting this. Have a good day," The manager said. Soon, Saki and the girls left with their shopping cart full of groceries. Riko helped Saki put the grocery bags in the trunk, then took the cart into the place where they keep shopping carts all by herself. As soon as she finished that, she leaped into the back seat.

"Why'd you have to yell back there? People were staring," Rina asked curiously with her arms crossed as Riko put her seatbelt on. Riko couldn't believe that even after all of that, Rina was still more concerned about people staring at them than an innocent person getting picked on by a bully.

"Because that man was being mean to the nice lady. This is why I keep telling you not to pick on Riko! I don't want you or her growing up to be like him. Would you like it if someone yelled at you for being who you are?" Saki told her.

"No," Riko mused before Rina could answer.

"That's why you should never judge people by their looks," Saki said when she started the car. After that, they drove back home.

* * *

"Have a good day, Izumi-chan!" One of the cashiers chirped kindly. The lady from before, Izumi, grabbed her flowery pink purse and turned toward the cashier with a contorted but merry smile on her face.

"Bye bye, Suzaki-san!" Izumi waved to her cashier friend and proceeded to skip out the door rather happily, completely unfazed by the rude bearded man's comments from earlier. It was like she was never insulted in the first place.

After she left the store, she walked to a nearby bus stop, sat on the porch, pulled out a book, and read it contentedly, without a care in the world. After about a few minutes, a screeching noise pulled her out of her book, and she looked up to find a big bus in front of her. She put her book away, pulled out her flower themed wallet, pulled out a few dollars, and walked onto the bus. She greeted the bus driver politely as usual, told her the name of her desired destination, and put her money in the glass box.

The bus was extremely empty save for only a select few people, which was quite odd considering its usually quite full. But she didn't mind at all. In fact, this made the trip a lot better. She sat down onto an empty seat in front of a window, put her seatbelt on, pulled her book out again, and allowed herself to be absorbed into its magical pages, taking her away from the noisy sirens polluting the air, the sound of the bus's motor, and the radio blaring away. After about ten or so minutes, the bus stopped.

"Yokota Avenue! Yokota Avenue!" The bus driver called out, pulling Izumi out from the beautiful confines of her book again.

"Dat's me!" Izumi said as she put her book into her purse, undid her seatbelt, and walked toward the doors, but not before giving the bus driver a kind thank you. After that, she skipped onto the bus stop and watched the bus leave. She saw the female bus driver waving back at her with a sweet smile, so she waved right back, with a big smile of her own.

After that, she walked down the street of a little neighborhood with a light heart, humming happily to herself and skipping on the sidewalk like a little kid after a successful first day of school. There was nobody else outside, so she could do whatever she wanted and not have to worry about anyone staring.

'_Ignore the bad stuff, focus only on the good!'_ Izumi thought as she skipped down the sidewalk. Soon, she found herself within the vicinity of a creamy white house. Once she found herself within the house's vicinity, she stopped skipping and walked onto the porch. She dug through her purse and pulled out a brass house key with lots of anime character keychains dangling from it like wind chimes. She put the key into the whole, turned it, and opened the door.

"I'm home!" Izumi exclaimed once she came into the house and pulled her key out of the keyhole with little difficulty.

"Whoa! Is that you, Izumin?" A young man's voice called out from the living room. Once Izumi put her coat into the closet, out came a rather youngish-looking man in his early to mid twenties with a mop of spiky raven black hair and radiant ocean blue eyes, wearing a maroon shirt underneath a black jacket with cream colored fur on the hood, dark blue jean pants, and brown boots. "You're home early! Welcome back!" The man exclaimed as he hugged Izumi.

"Hi, Takeru!" Izumi chirped back as she embraced him back. Soon, the man, Takeru, kissed her on the cheek and released her from his embrace. "Is everyfin okay here?"

"Yep! Come on in! You're probably dead tired. I bought some orange juice earlier today, so hopefully that'll help," Takeru said as Izumi put her purse on the couch. "I'll make dinner in a bit," He added.

"Aww, dat's so sweet!" Izumi crooned sweetly. "Where's Sayo-chan?"

"She's in the dining room," Takeru told her. Right after that, a microwave in the kitchen made a long _BEEEP_ sound. "Oh! The formula's ready!" Takeru said as he scrambled to the microwave and pulled out a baby bottle full of some kind of baby formula.

"I'll do dat for you. Ish dat okay?" Izumi told him as she took the warm bottle and ambled into the dining room to find a little crib next to the dining room table, with a pudgy little baby inside. The baby had a mop of little golden locks dangling from her large, round head, donning a pale cotton candy pink and cloud white onesie with little white bunny rabbits embroidered all over it. The baby, Sayo, cooed a little once Izumi leaned over to pick her up gently.

"Hi Sayo-chan! Mommy's home! Here's some nice yummy formula!" Izumi crooed as she cradled her cooing baby in her arms, picked up the warm bottle, sat on a chair, and slowly gave Sayo her formula. Sayo took it without a fuss and began drinking it up. "Good girl! Dun drink too fast," Izumi crooned, praising her baby for actually accepting the formula. It didn't look like she disliked it, which made Takeru let out a sigh of relief.

"Whew! It seems I got the temperature right. Thank goodness," Takeru said.

"How haff you been since I've been away, Take-chan?" Izumi asked as she continued feeding Sayo, who was already in happyland drinking her bottle contentedly, without a care in the world.

"I'm feeling kinda tired, but it's nothing too serious. Sayo-chan really knows how to keep me on my toes, and she can't even walk yet!" Takeru said once he sat down on an empty chair with her.

"I notice you washed the dirty dishes and put them in the dishwasher! Thanks!" Izumi told him with a smile.

"You're welcome. I just ran it earlier today, and I'm leaving the dishwasher open so the humidity gets out," Takeru told her, pointing to the dish washer.

"I'll put them away when I can. I better get dinner started," Takeru said as he got up from his chair and ambled into the kitchen.

"But aren'cha tired from takin' care of Sayo all day?" Izumi asked when she finished giving Sayo her formula.

"Nah! Makin' dinner's nothing I can't handle," Takeru said as he went into his freezer and grabbed a bag of vegetables from it. Sayo suddenly began whimpering a little. Izumi became concerned.

"What's wrong, Sayo?" Izumi asked as Sayo let out a wail. Izumi unknowingly took a whiff of the air around her, and that pretty much gave her the answer she needed. "Ohh. You need a new one. I'll take you upstairs," Izumi said gently as she took Sayo up to her room, while at the same time patting her back gently so she can burp, which she did.

Izumi went into her daughter's cheery-looking bedroom and gently placed her onto the changing table. She found the bag where the baby's diapers are in, pulled out a fresh one, and proceeded to remove the soiled one. She put it in the trash can, wiped her baby down, sprinkled baby powder on her, and put the fresh diaper on her. Sayo already began cooing once the process was complete.

'_This is the only thing I don't like about taking care of babies, but it's not their fault. It's what they do. Once they're old enough, we won't have to do it anymore,'_ Izumi thought as she put Sayo in her crib and sang a lofty lullaby despite sounding a little bit slurred.

Soon, Sayo's eyes felt heavy, and they closed before she could coo again. With a smile, Izumi washed her hands in the bathroom and went back into the dining room. Takeru already had dinner going, but he felt free to just sit down with Izumi so they can relax and talk. Izumi told him about what happened earlier today.

"Sorry that had to happen to ya. I swear, if I ever see that guy, I'm gonna give him a good beat down!" Takeru said, punching his fist into his palm.

"Now now, Take-chan. No need for dat. But a nice lady yelled at him and he left. I just ignored him the whole time," Izumi told him.

"That's good. But still, it's so stupid how people just outright assume you're stupid and slow when you're really not and act like they know you better than you yourself do. Seriously, people need to stop acting so dumb!" Takeru exclaimed.

"I agree. But I'm okay! I'm just happy havin' you and Sayo-chan in my life, and my mom sed I shuddnt let anyfin get me down!" Izumi told him and gave him a little peck on the cheek, making him blush a little, but not in an embarrassed way.

Once dinner was ready, they sat at the dinner table, chewing away at their food. However, Izumi's smile faded, and she found herself staring off into space, not touching her food. Takeru took notice. "Something wrong, Izumin?"

"I wonder if...I can be a good mother to Sayo-chan?" Izumi asked softly.

"What brought that on? You're taking great care of Sayo," Takeru told her reassuringly.

"But what about when she gets older? What if I can't do shtuff like help her with homework? What if she asks questions I won't...be able to answer?" Izumi asked again. "I graduated high school, but dat's it. I'm not dat smart either."

She glanced at a little table in the dining room, smiling at a picture a younger version of herself. The Izumi in the picture was wearing a sparkly purple dress, with a silver crown on her head. She was smiling radiantly, holding a bouquet of white and red roses, wearing a red sash with the words _'HIKARIBASHI HIGH HOMECOMING QUEEN'_ written on it in white. Some multicolored confetti was falling from the sky. How sweet those memories were. It already made her feel a little better.

"Who cares if you're not smart? Being smart isn't everything," Takeru said. "My mom wanted me to go to college, but I went to a community college once, and it just wasn't for me. But that didn't stop me from getting where I am now. My dad wasn't smart, but he started his own lawn mowing company, and I have a friend who's blind and owns a huge textile factory. But yeah, I can see why you'd be worried. But people like you because you're cheerful and nice and friendly, and you never give up. Not only that, if you ever need help, you're more than welcome to ask me, your family, my family, or your friends and neighbors. I'm sure they'd love to help you if you need them."

"Yeth. Good point," Izumi muttered doubtfully.

When Takeru finished dinner, he got up and went to the fridge looking for something sweet to eat for dessert. But there's nothing in there except some eggs, milk, veggies, and other healthy foods. "Awww! No dessert! I thought I saved that slice of strawberry cake!"

"I can go get some!" Izumi chirped. "I'll go right now!" She immediately grabbed her purse and darted right out the door, leaving Takeru alone with Sayo.

_'The convenience store has cake slices! I can get them cheap, and I still have money on me!'_ Izumi thought as she walked to the dollar store on foot. It isn't far from here, and Izumi got there just fine. She didn't find any strawberry cake slices, but she did find tiramisu slices, and those were perfect! Tiramisu was her mother's favorite cake, and she did know that in Italian, tiramisu means "please take me to heaven." Izumi liked that.

She bought the Tiramisu slices and left the convenience store. But the doubt from earlier sprung back up in her heart, causing her to stop on the sidewalk. She wanted to shake it off, but the doubt latched onto her and wouldn't come off.

* * *

"We've been out a long time, haven't we?" Starbeam asked as she, Moonbeam, and Sunbeam sat on the rooftop of a convenience store, away from the eyes of the shoppers down below. Moonbeam and Sunbeam both let out some very exhausted sighs.

"Longer than usual," Sunbeam piped in.

"It's been a week now, and Lovebeam is nowhere to be found. I'm getting really worried," Moonbeam mused sadly. "I really hope she isn't...y'know."

"I don't think so. If she were, we'd feel it," Sunbeam said. "This is Lovebeam we're talking about. She wouldn't let anything get her that easily. Heck, she even uses her screechy whining as a weapon, and that's proven pretty useful in the past. Besides, she's probably just a little farther away from us. We can't assume the worst."

"I know. But I can't help it. I'm so worried. If anything happened to her...I'd never forgive myself!" Moonbeam whimpered, her long ears drooping downward.

"Me too. But I think we should retire for today. We're very exhausted, and if we go past our limit, the repercussions would be perilous," Starbeam told them.

"I agree. Let's go back home for now. I don't want Riko getting worried," Sunbeam said.

"We ought to replenish our energy first before we venture back home," Starbeam told them.

"I do wonder how that police officer is doing. I hope he's alright, too," Moonbeam mused. Then she looked down and saw Izumi coming out of the convenience store with a small plastic bag in her hand. She couldn't help but look down on her from above.

"What's up, Moonbeam?" Sunbeam asked curiously.

"That girl...she's crying," Moonbeam whispered.

"You can tell even from way up here?" Sunbeam asked. _'Wow. She's good,'_ Sunbeam thought.

"I wonder why she's so sad?" Moonbeam mused as she floated away from the roof of the convenience store. Sunbeam and Starbeam looked at each other, then followed their younger sister to make sure nothing happened to her in the mean time.

Questions ran through Izumi's mind. Would she be a good mother to Sayo? She changes her diaper, feeds her every day, burps her, and does everything else a mother should with her baby. Takeru helps out too, so that's good. That part, she's not worried about. But what about when she gets older? Will Sayo be smarter than her? Izumi assumed she likely will, since Sayo came out healthy, without any problems. But what if Sayo comes across a problem that she wants her mother to answer and she can't? What if Sayo gets picked on and she can't be able to help her when she needs it like a mother should? Or what if when Sayo gets much older, she hangs out with the wrong crowd and Izumi can't do anything to stop her?

Just thinking about it all made Izumi's eyes water a little bit.

After a while, she decided not to think about it anymore. She left the dollar store and walked home. Out of concern, the fairies followed her, thinking Zenjin might want to attack her just for kicks.

"I sense some lingering sadness dwelling within her heart," Starbeam said.

As soon as she said that, however, Moonbeam's long, lilac ears twitched, standing up further than normal. Moonbeam's sterling silver eyes suddenly widened with fear, like saucers. "Oh no!" She yipped.

Sunbeam and Starbeam turned around. "Oh no what?" Sunbeam asked, suddenly curious.

They were right to keep an eye on Izumi.

"YEEEK!" A loud scream and the familiar sound of a ray of light being shot at someone made them turn around to find Izumi lying on the concrete of the street, her Soul Portal exposed and bare for all to see, and Zenjin, looking very grim and disgusted, descending before her. Izumi slowly got back on her feet and although she's surprised at the fact that some weirdo just attacked her, she's more surprised by this giant mirror floating in front of her and following her everywhere she went. But she knew Zenjin's trouble just by looking at him, and her anger overtook her surprise.

"Who are you, and whadja do dat for?!" Izumi yelped angrily.

"Where'd he come from?!" Moonbeam yelped with her hands over her mouth.

"Because you're ugly as sin, that's what! You look like trash!" Zenjin told her condescendingly, his words literally filled to the brim with venom. He snapped his fingers, causing a red wall to appear behind Izumi. As soon as it appeared, glowing gold ropes caught her and strapped her to the wall.

"HELP MEEEEE! SOMEONE'S ATTACKING MEEEEE!" Izumi yelled as loud as she could muster, hoping someone would hear her. If only someone could hear her.

"I'll go tell Riko!" Moonbeam said as she fluttered from the scene faster than a cheetah to find Riko.

"Izumi!" Out from her house burst Takeru, his eyes consumed with both worry and anger. As soon as he laid eyes on Zenjin, Takeru's ocean blue eyes became feral with intent to knock him off his feet. "Get off my wife, you fiend!" He shouted as he charged toward Zenjin like a very ferocious lion about to pounce on its prey.

Zenjin didn't look the least bit fazed. "Go away!" Zenjin mused as he shot a ray of light at the helpless Takeru, sending him flying and falling right on top of both Mayumi and his mother, knocking them all unconscious.

"Take-chan!" Izumi yelled as Zenjin peered into her Soul Portal, then screamed louder than she ever did.

"Lemme at him! Lemme at him!" Sunbeam yelled as she tried to go after Zenjin and give him what he deserved, but Starbeam pulled on her tail, keeping her from doing what she wanted.

"You can't! He's far too dangerous for us! Please, fall back! If you attempt to assail him, you'll only jeopardize the lives of the people here! We are not strong enough to face him!" Starbeam pleaded desperately as she tried to keep Sunbeam from attacking Zenjin, knowing how perilous the repercussions would be for both Izumi and the rest of the neighborhood, especially since they were in a very populated area where they could be seen.

But what Starbeam didn't expect was a relatively strong blow to her face, causing her to release Sunbeam's tail. When she finally comprehended what happened, she saw Sunbeam staring daggers at her with angry etes.

"Oh, so you're saying you care more about being a coward than the fact that someone's life is in danger, along with everyone else here?! You care more about ME causing a problem than Zenjin, who's messing with someone's soul?! You really ARE heartless, Starbeam!" Sunbeam yelled, completely misinterpreting Starbeam's concern. "If we don't do something, he's gonna put everyone's lives in danger anyway!"

"Hmph! You're so stupid to think you're so special!" Zenjin sneered at the fearful, violated Izumi with eyes brimming with hatred, similar to Sunbeam's, but for a different reason entirely. "You think being strong and happy will make people like you? That it'll end your suffering? Well, tough nuts! I'll show you that your meager existence means nothing to everyone here, especially not me!" Zenjin screamed as he rummaged through her Soul Portal and yanked out her soul, causing her to finally fall unconscious.

"Let! Me! GO!" Sunbeam yelled as she tried to go at him again.

"We have to wait until the Pretty Cures arrive!" Starbeam reasoned desperately, stopping her before she could do anything reckless.

"Go crazy, Human Trash!" Zenjin yelled, holding Izumi's now corrupted soul in the air. The glass orb glowed black, floating into the air. Soon, it increased in size until it morphed into what appeared to be a giant, pitch black ferret with long whiskers and bloody red eyes. As soon as it came into the world, it began sniffing the air like it smelled food.

"Awww, come on, you trash! You're supposed to destroy everything, kill people, and wreak havoc like a crazy maniac! Isn't that what you monsters of the week are supposed to do?!" Zenjin whined petulantly like a little two-year-old, appalled by the giant ferret's content sniffing, and its complete lack of desire to destroy anything like he wanted.

"Jeez, he's such a brat," Sunbeam sneered under her breath.

"That, I agree with," Starbeam piped in.

Suddenly, a blue naginata shot out from the sky and almost impaled Zenjin, had he not managed to scramble out of the way. The giant black ferret didn't even see it, as it was still too busy sniffing and scratching its whiskers, completely trapped in its own little world.

"Stop right there, knave!" The bold, booming voice of Cure Starlight echoed from above. Zenjin looked up to see the entire Pretty Cure quartet standing on the roof of one house not far from where the black ferret is, with eyes glinting with courage, without one hint of fear in them. "You should be ashamed of yourself, you callous knave! Playing with people's insecurities and corrupting their souls for your own amusement without any regard for human lives and their privacy is the most atrocious crime ever! Have you no remorse at all?"

"We're here to put you in your place! Meow!" Cure Twilight piped in, echoing Cure Starlight's argument.

"I am the light that will brighten your world, Cure Twilight!"

"I am the lights that illuminate the darkness, Cure Starlight!"

"I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

"I am the light that will warm your heart, Cure Dusk!"

"Cut the stupid catch phrases and quit ruining my fun, you trash!" Zenjin yelled as he flew away, not wanting to get involved with the Pretty Cures at the moment.

"HEY! Get back here! I wanna bash your brains in!" Sunbeam yelled, but he was gone before she could even land one little smack on him.

Cure Twilight then caught a glance down below. She saw Izumi lying on the concrete, her Soul Portal exposed and bare for all to see, unconscious. Her husband just woke back up.

"Hey! That's the lady who was harassed at the store earlier! That ferret's gotta be her!" Cure Twilight exclaimed, her eyes wide with horror over the revelation that the giant ferret was the nice cashier who was rudely harassed earlier today.

"Hey ferret! Try some of this! Dusk Medley!" Cure Dusk shouted as she fired a flurry of fiery musical notes at the distracted ferret, hoping to knock it down and get it done and over with. However, much to her surprise, without even noticing or looking, the ferret's long tail swished back and forth, causing the fiery music notes to literally disappear into thin air once they made contact.

"What?! No way!" Cure Dusk shouted with disbelief.

"We'd better get its attention so it doesn't destroy the neighborhood! Starlight Kick!" Cure Starlight exclaimed as she leaped into the air, spun around like a top, and managed to land a drop kick on the giant ferret's head, finally pulling it out of its reverie.

Soon, it noticed the girls and finally decided to attack them. It slashed at them a few times with its sharp claws, but the girls were agile enough to evade them. Cure Dawn did a few back flips to evade them, landing on the end of the street as she stopped. She pulled out her nunchucks and made them glow in a golden light.

"Dawn Slam!" With gusto, she ran over to the ferret, leaped into the air, and slammed her glowing nunchucks on the ferret's neck, causing it to screech in pain, which made Cure Twilight cover her ears for a bit.

"Be careful! The woman has Down Syndrome!" Cure Twilight called out.

"How do you know?!" Cure Dusk yelped.

"I saw her in the food store earlier!" Cure Twilight shouted back.

"_What will I do when Sayo gets older? Will I even be able to be a good mother to her when she grows up? There's so much I can't do! How can I be a good parent to her?" _The ferret moaned in a somber voice as it managed to slash Cure Dusk and knock her into a tree. Cure Starlight grabbed her naginata and stabbed it into the ferret's tail, causing it to screech again, and in addition, causing Cure Twilight to squeeze her hands onto her ears and fall to her knees, cowering.

When it stopped screeching, Cure Twilight stood back up and got her Twilight Ring out. "Twilight Sparkle!" She threw it at the ferret. For once, it actually managed to hit! Overjoyed, Twilight cheered. "Yay! It actually hit it this time!" But knowing this situation was too dire for cheering, she donned a serious expression.

"Umm...Miss Cashier? Sorry I don't know your name, but I don't think what you can or can't do matters when being a parent! You should just love your child and be there for her! You don't need to be good at everything to be a good parent! My mom doesn't know what it's like to be like me, but that doesn't mean she's not a good parent! Both she and Dad always help me when I need them, and they love me for me!" Twilight exclaimed, hoping her voice was loud enough for the ferret to hear.

"Riko! This isn't the time for cheesy sentimental talk!" Cure Dusk exclaimed as she stepped on the ferret's tail, making it screech in pain. Twilight covered her ears again before running from the scene, frightened by the ferret's high pitched squealing.

Cure Dawn landed some good punches on the ferret's body, causing it to fall on the concrete. Some people began running for their lives, not wanting to be caught in the crossfire, fearing their houses could be destroyed.

Cure Dusk got her bow and arrow out and aimed it at the ferret, who's busy trying to scratch Cure Starlight, but the latter has her naginata blocking its claws. "Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Releasing the arrow, it flew right into the ferret's back, causing flames to encase it, though not for long. The ferret managed to break out of the flames, but Cure Dusk put her arrow away and landed some punches on its head, keeping it from doing any damage.

"Starlight Shower!" To make sure the ferret didn't attack Twilight, Starlight unleashed her rain of glowing blue stars, causing the black ferret to cower and cover its eyes so none of the stars can hurt it. But that proved to be rather redundant considering the falling stars are scratching its body.

"Aw yeah! We're winning!" Cure Dawn cheered, throwing her fists in the air.

"Ready for awesome finishing purification move time, girls?" Cure Twilight exclaimed.

With a twirl of her naginata, Cure Starlight stood like a warrior once she held it like an old soldier would a long weapon. "Ready!"

Cure Dawn readied her nunchucks. "Ready!"

"Aw! I wanted to say that!" Cure Dusk complained when she readied her bow and arrow again.

"Twilight Serenade!"

"Starlight Shower!"

"Dawn Flame!"

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!"

All of their attacks consumed the ferret, and it dissintigrated into the air, stripping it all the way down to the now purified glass orb that is Izumi's soul. Once that was finished, the girls changed back to their normal forms.

"Can I put it back in her body this time?" Anzu asked Riko.

"Sure! Just be extra careful though," Riko told her. Anzu smiled, swiftly walked over to the orb, and very gently picked it up.

"Izumi! Izumi! Wake up, Izumi!" Takeru, having woken up, shook his unconscious wife's body like crazy, his blue eyes drowning in a tsunami of worry and concern for his wife's welfare.

'_So that's her name. Izumi-san...'_ Riko thought.

Anzu dropped Izumi's soul into her Soul Portal. After that, she, the girls, and the fairies left the couple alone so they can cope with what happened.

"Yay! We finally defeated a Corrupt Sentinel and didn't destroy anything! Woohoo! Yeah!" Riko cheered, jumped up and down, and spun around before high fiving Anzu, who happily gave one back to her. Marina silently rolled her eyes.

"That was surprisingly easy. Usually the Corrupt Sentinels we fight are a lot tougher," Hotaru mused.

"Either it was weaker than normal or you guys are getting stronger. Those are the only explanations I can come up with," Moonbeam piped in.

Sunbeam didn't look very satisfied, though. She sat on Marina's shoulder with her little arms crossed and her lips puckered out like a duck's beak. "Hmph! I still wish I got to kick Zenjin's sorry butt!"

"Hey Sunbeam. Wanna hang out at my house?" Marina asked with a soft smile.

"Really? Is that okay?" Sunbeam asked, her irritability dissipating into thin air. Marina nodded. "Ohhh! Thanks, Mari-chan!" Sunbeam cheered and hugged her new friend. Everyone else let out some friendly giggles in response.

'_I'm glad we saved her. She deserves it. Maybe I'll say hi to her if Mom and I ever go back to the food store. I should make that a habit. Maybe we can be friends!'_ Riko thought. Who knows? Maybe Izumi would be a lovely friend! Whatever their situation is, Riko figured Izumi can overcome it no problem, if her husband and anyone who loves her are by her side.

Footnotes:

1\. Furoshiki are a type of cloth with colorful patterns on them. The Japanese often use them for carrying small packages for convenience.


	7. Lovebeam is the Brattiest Fairy Ever!

Chapter 7: What a Drama Queen! Lovebeam is the Brattiest Fairy Ever!

The very next day, after school, Riko finally found a good opportunity to ask the question. "Hey Mom?"

"Yes, Riko?" Saki asked, sitting in the family den behind the living room, reading her shiny new kindle, watching an episode of _Say Yes To The Dress_ like she usually does on Wednesday afternoons.

"I was wondering...would it be okay if I invited my friends over this week?" Riko finally asked. Saki's eyes widened a little bit, like she never expected something like this out of her oldest daughter. When Riko saw her expression, she took it as disapproval. "Uhh...if this week doesn't work, that's okay!" She stammered shyly and doubtfully. _'She's gonna say _'we'll see,'_ I know it, and that usually always means no!'_ Riko thought fearfully, already assuming the worst. She could feel her fingers numbing in L-shaped positions, tense with anticipation.

"Sure! That'd be wonderful!" Saki suddenly exclaimed with a radiant smile, leaving Riko quite flabbergasted. Her fingers regained movement.

"Really? I can?" Riko was unable to comprehend it at first since it came so fast.

"I don't see why not. Oh, you've been dreaming for this day to come, haven't you? I'm off work tomorrow, and Ari doesn't start his new job until next Monday, so it'd be lovely if they could come then. But ask if it's okay with them first, sweetie. They might be busy," Saki told her, her smile unchanging.

Riko couldn't believe her ears. Her friends can come over! Saki said yes! Fortune was finally smiling on her at last. As Saki said, Riko had been dreaming for a day like this to come, and she thought she died and went to heaven. Riko couldn't contain the overflowing joy and glee that made her want to burst with happiness. At this point, she didn't care if her mother or sister said it was inappropriate.

With a cute, high pitched squeal, she glomped her mother and wrapped her skinny little arms around her. "Ohhhh thank you thank you thank you, Mom! You're the absolute best mother in the whole wide world! I LOVE you!" Riko squealed before planting a very warm and affection-filled kiss on her surprised but happy mother's cheek.

"I love you too, sweetie," Saki smiled back as she returned the loving hug.

"In fact, I oughta call them right now! Where are those phone numbers?!" Riko yelped as she released Saki from her embrace and rushed to her backpack to find the phone numbers Anzu, Kyoya, and Marina gave her. She didn't even notice the fact that she passed right by Rina, who looked at her with quite a shocked and displeased look. Riko was quite oblivious to that too, as she continued to rummage through her backpack without a second thought.

Rina walked into the den. "Did Riko say she's gonna have friends over tomorrow?"

"Yes. Isn't that great, Rina?" Saki replied with a smile.

"She doesn't have any friends!" Rina exclaimed, extremely flabbergasted by such a peculiar, far out idea, her own green eyes widening just as much as Saki's did earlier. Riko? Having friends over? To her, it was as impossible as aliens coming to take over the world.

"You don't know that," Saki told her, her smile dissipating, donning an expression of stern disappointment over Rina's petulant outburst.

"Yes I do! And people shouldn't come here! She's just gonna be weird and make everybody stare at us and talk about us and say stuff like, _'Ohhh! Rina's sister is a big fat weirdo who screams a lot and pretends she's a cat! That's so babyish!'_ and they'll hate us forever, me especially!" Rina complained petulantly.

"Rina. You should be happy for your sister. She's made friends, and she wants to have them over. If we do have them over, I do **not** want you saying that stuff or picking on her the whole time. I especially don't want you telling them to go away or stay away from her. It's very rude and inconsiderate. Now behave yourself when they come. Do you understand, young lady?" Saki told her lucidly and calmly, but in an austere tone. Rina wanted to talk back, but she knew better than to cross her mother, especially if she was angry, so she kept her mouth shut.

* * *

Kyoya sat beside the kitchen counter, right next to the phone, sitting impatiently in his electric wheelchair. He had his arms crossed, his green eyes brimming with impatience but not irritation. An older woman with short, scraggly crimson hair of a much darker shade than Kyoya's and soft, kind chocolate brown eyes stood in the kitchen washing the dishes.

"You've been sitting by the phone for half an hour now, Kyo-chan. You waiting for someone to call?" The woman asked curiously, having had enough of seeing him there and being silent for half an hour straight.

"Yeah, Mom. That girl I told you about. She's invited me to hang out with her, but she said she'd call and let me know if I can or not," Kyoya replied calmly.

"I see. Did she say what time she'd call?" The woman, Kyoya's mother, asked as she put some more wet dishes in the dishwasher and scrubbed down a big plate right afterward.

"Nah, just after school," Kyoya replied again.

Kyoya's mother cracked a smile once she put the plate in the dishwasher. "You've talked about this girl quite a lot. You haven't been this happy for a long time," She told him with a soft smile on her face. Kyoya looked toward the entrance that led to the living room, averting his mother's kind gaze, but not with any ill intent.

Then came the moment Kyoya had been waiting for. _Ring ring ring ring riiiiing_

"Check the caller ID first," Kyoya's mother exclaimed over the phone's ringing.

Kyoya gasped since the ringing was so unexpected, but he answered it quickly. "Riko? That you?" His initial surprise dissipated immediately once he heard Riko's voice. "Hey! So did she say yes? She did?! Awesome! Whoa! Tomorrow? Hang on just a sec."

Kyoya turned in his mother's direction. "Hey, Mom! Riko wants to know if tomorrow'll be good. Is it?" He called out.

"Sure. I don't see why not. Both your father and I are off work," Kyoya's mother replied with a smile.

Kyoya went right back to the phone. "My mom just said tomorrow'll be perfect! Mm-Hmm. Mm-Hmm. No, that's fine. Mom and Dad are gonna drop me off. They always do. Sure! I'll bring some of my games so we can battle our Pokemon and stuff like that! It's okay. Dad's got a portable ramp in the van, so don't worry about that. Got any word from Anzu? She's coming too? Awesome! Thanks so much, Riko! I can't wait to come over! See ya tomorrow at four! Bye!" Kyoya exclaimed excitedly as he hit the end call button on the phone and put it back on the counter.

"Woohoo! I'm gonna hang out with my friends tomorrow! This is awesome! Yahoo!" Kyoya cheered like an overhyped baseball fan. He wanted to jump around and spin around and cheer, but since his legs don't work, he had to make do with pumping his fists in the air and spinning around in his electric wheelchair, and he had to do that in the living room. Even then, it didn't spin fast enough for him to be satisfied, but he didn't mind. He was just too happy to finally be able to hang out with Riko outside of school. Kyoya's mother couldn't help but laugh heartily as she watched her wheelchair bound son spin around the living room, cheering like he passed a hard math test.

Right around then, a man came into the dining room. His hair was a rich, dark shade of chocolate brown, his eyes the same green hue as Kyoya's. His hair was flat with a few spikes here and there, along with a short and prickly little brown beard and mustache trailing all the curves and corners of his face, wearing a white shirt under a dark blue suit, a dark green tie, and black leather shoes. As soon as he came into the dining room, his eyes widened a little in awe of the happy boy spinning around the living room.

"Kayoko? What's Kyoya so happy about?" The man asked his wife in confusion.

"A new friend he made invited him to her house, and tomorrow they're going to hang out. Isn't this great, Jiroemon?" Kayoko told her husband. Jiroemon's confusion faded in an instant, and a smile popped right onto his face.

"Wow. That IS great, especially since he hasn't been this happy since before the accident," Jiroemon exclaimed, delighted at the thought of his son being able to hang out with a friend or two. His eyesight began to subtly blur, and the smile he had on now looked a little sad. _'You really deserve it, Kyoya. It's been so long since you've been able to hang out with anyone...or even be truly happy. Words can't describe how happy it makes me to see you like this right now,'_ Jiroemon thought.

Suddenly, Kyoya stopped wheeling in circles. "I better go pack the games I wanna bring with me!" Kyoya exclaimed as he wheeled to the bottom of the stairs. After he stopped, he very slowly pulled himself out of his electric wheelchair, managed to stand on his knees on the bottom of the stairs, put his elbows on some stairs, and very slowly began to pull himself up the stairs, looking like he's crawling. With every inch he moved, he pulled himself up by pushing his elbows onto the stairs and moving by his knees. Since Kyoya's eyes are fixated on the top of the stairs, he's oblivious to the fact that Jiroemon is right behind him.

"If you want, I can carry you up the stairs!" Jiroemon exclaimed, his face literally covered with worry, like he was afraid Kyoya will slip, fall, and hurt himself.

"I'll be fine, Dad! I've practiced!" Kyoya exclaimed, delighted to be halfway up the stairs.

"Well, I'll be down here in case you fall," Jiroemon said, his wrinkled face donning a mask of anxiety. _'I want to help him, but he doesn't want me to. I have to respect that, but...I feel so horrible watching him struggle like this. I'm sorry, Kyoya,'_ Jiroemon said as he looked down at his leather shoes. Finally, after a few minutes, Kyoya made it to the top of the stairs like he climbed a mountain. He saw another wheelchair-this time a non-electric one, pulled himself into it, and wheeled into his room all by himself.

The walls were white with dark brown doors, one as the entrance and one for a closet, both with glass doorknobs. His bed, covered with a dark green and dark blue striped bed sheet with matching pillowcases, game consoles, T-shirts, and books on varying subjects, stood on pale hardwood flooring. A window on the back of the room overlooked his backyard, with a big tree in the back, fenced in by an old, rickety fence with a few holes in the boards, allowing free passage for any and all small animals.

He had a nice, wooden computer desk made to fit in the corner of his room, with a shiny black computer on it, with a matching mouse and keyboard. On the other side of his room was a wooden bureau containing lots of clothes, with a lamp on top of it. On the right side of his bed was a tiny white night stand with two little drawers, the bottom one smaller than the other, with a raven black alarm clock and a set of black binoculars on it. Below the window overlooking the back yard was a tortoise shaped footstool, soft like a bean bag.

Kyoya wheeled to his bed and pulled out a small, brownish green Nintendo DS carrying case. He gently slid his Nintendo DS in it, along with some games. He zipped it up, and put it on his bed. He wheeled to his night stand, grabbed the binoculars, and wheeled himself to the tortoise-shaped footstool. He pulled himself off of his wheelchair, got on the footstool, opened the window, and looked out at his back yard. Standing on his knees on the footstool, he began looking into his binoculars, wondering what's new out in his backyard.

"Man, this is great! I'm gonna hang out with Riko tomorrow! Now I wonder if any of those woodpeckers are gonna peck at the tree? I hope that pretty one comes back," Kyoya mused to himself happily as he peered into his binoculars, right in front of his glasses, and tried to find any woodpeckers. No woodpeckers in sight, not that he really minded. Just the thick leaves of the tree, the thick, bulky bark, the green grass popping up from the ground, some flowers Kayoko planted, some houses farther back on the next street, a cinder block lying on the ground, a pink thing with long ears limping toward the tree, etc.

Wait…

At first, Kyoya thought his eyes were playing tricks on him. He rubbed his eyes with his fists before looking back into his binoculars. He peered into them again to see if what he saw was real. To his surprise, it was.

There was a pink thing with ridiculously long, floppy ears that went way past its stubby little feet walking-or rather, limping-toward the big tree. It clearly looked exhausted, like it hadn't eaten or slept. It didn't even make it to the tree in time. Its tiny little legs gave out, and it collapsed onto the soft, evergreen grass.

"What is that thing?" Kyoya asked himself as he put his binoculars back on the night stand. "I oughta go and check it out," He mused to himself as he wheeled to the top of the stairs and pulled himself off of his manual wheelchair. Instead of crawling back down, he sat on the steps and pushed himself down on them one by one, carefully. This proved to be easier than crawling up the stairs, but he wasn't sure if his rear liked it. He made it to the bottom and pulled himself onto his electric wheelchair.

He wheeled through the kitchen, out onto the backyard deck, down the ramp Jiroemon made for it, and onto the green grass. He stopped to check if the pink thing is still there. It is, thankfully. Slowly, he wheeled toward it. Once he got close enough, he bent down to pick it up. A slight jolt of pain went into his back as he kneeled too far, but he didn't pay any heed to it.

He gently picked up the pink thing by one of its long, floppy ears, put it in his lap, and wheeled back inside. Thankfully for him, his parents are in different rooms, so he didn't have to worry about them seeing him. He crawled back up the stairs, got back in the manual chair, put the pink thing on his lap, and wheeled back into his room.

Once he came back in, he decided to get a closer look at the thing he picked up. Its fur was a very pale, warm, soft shade of pink, feeling softer than the fur on a young cat going past its kitten stage, with the ends of its long ears being a wild shade of raspberry red. He noticed that those red parts had curves on them similar to hearts. It's ears were long and floppy, stretching way down past its legs. It's arms were equally stubby. It's eyes and mouth were both closed. Around its neck was a pale, mandarin orange ribbon with a tiny little red heart shaped decoration on it. He turned it around and saw that it had a red heart on its back, a thin, pink and red striped tail, with a red heart right at the end of it. He turned it back around and examined it some more.

"Is this some kind of stuffed animal?" Kyoya asked out loud as he held the pink stuffed animal-like thing in his arms. What was it exactly? A rabbit? A dog? "Nah, it couldn't be. I swear I saw it move like it was real."

And he'd be right.

A loud but subdued, rumbling sound suddenly echoed in the room. Kyoya knew that sound anywhere: the hunger rumble. But it didn't feel like it came from his stomach. If it did come from his stomach, he'd feel it. But he didn't. Where did it come from? Better yet, where _could_ it come from? He was the only human being in the room. Someone's hungry, but it wasn't him, nor was it anyone else he knew of living in this house.

"Okay. That was freaky," Kyoya said out loud, surprised by the fact that he heard someone's stomach growling that wasn't his, and there's nobody else in the room with him. But it would get freakier. A soft, low pitched squeak suddenly caught his ear. He turned around to face the pink doll he was holding.

But it wasn't a doll. It's eyes were moving, and it's mouth was open a little bit.

The pink animal's eyes opened, confirming Kyoya's suspicion for good: it WAS real. The pink creature's eyes were a pretty lavender color. Kyoya didn't dare make a sound, even though his insides were doing back flips, his emerald eyes are as wide as saucers, and he wants answers as to what the heck this pink thing is. Soon, the pink creature's eyes fully opened, and it looked Kyoya straight in the eyes.

Neither knew what to say. An awkward silence consumed the room like a tsunami, even though nobody is hurt or drowning. Finally, something broke the silence, but nothing Kyoya expected.

A piercing screech came right out of the pink thing's mouth, causing Kyoya himself to scream a little in fright. Thankfully for him, the pink thing's scream didn't last long. It flew on his bed, grabbed some of his books, and began throwing them at him like projectiles.

"Evil villain! Get back! Go away! Go away, you vile creature!" The pink animal screeched in an ear bleedingly high pitched voice. Kyoya managed to hold his arms up in a defensive pose to keep the books from hitting his face, but he was just as confused and frightened as the pink creature was.

"Jeez! Calm down, will ya?! I'm not gonna hurt you! And stop throwing my books! Hey! That hurts, y'know! Ow!" Kyoya protested as the pink animal kept throwing books at him. Finally, the pink animal stopped, donning an angry look on its pudgy face, it's lilac eyes blazing with courage, and put its stubby little arms on its hips.

"Don't think you're so tough, evil villain! I know what you're thinking! I'm not some weak little cutesy-poo damsel in distress you can control for your own selfish deeds! This little fairy is one tough little cookie, and if you think you can defeat me because I have cute looks and look like I can't defend myself, think again!" The pink animal shouted, pointing a ballpoint pen at Kyoya like it was a sword. Soon, the pink animal got a better look at him, and it's eyes softened up a bit upon seeing the wide-eyed, flabbergasted redhead.

"Oh, Wait. You're not an evil villain," The pink animal said in a much nicer sounding, albeit very squeaky, female voice.

"Who did you think I was?! Slenderman?! Chucky?! The Joker?!" Kyoya shouted. How can think little pink creature claim that he's a villain when she's the one who threw books at him and threatened to maim him with one of his ballpoint pens?

"Kyoya? You okay?" Jiroemon's voice called out from the other side of the door.

"Oh, snap!" Kyoya yelped as he grabbed the pale pink creature and stashed it under his bed. He pulled himself out of his chair and slumped on the side of his bed. "Yeah, Dad?" He said, allowing Jiroemon to come into the room, looking rather worried.

"I heard a scream. What happened? You're not hurt, are you?" Jiroemon asked, his voice peppered with worry.

Kyoya let out a rueful sounding laugh, rubbing his cherry red hair with one of his hands. "Nah. I was on the computer and some horror movie ad popped up, and I forgot to turn down the volume. It blasted my ear drums out!" Kyoya replied with a forced laugh. Jiroemon went over to him and bent down to his level.

"Are you sure you're not hurt? You didn't try walking on your own again, did you? And why are your books all over the floor? Did you slip and fall? I keep telling you not to push yourself so hard! You can seriously get hurt if you slip on one of these books!" Jiroemon interrogated him worriedly, not noticing the rather miffed look on Kyoya's face.

"I'm _fine_, Dad. Quit worrying," Kyoya told him, a bit more sternly this time. "I didn't slip. I was trying to get one and they all scattered on the floor. I'll clean them up in a bit."

"I can clean them if you want," Jiroemon offered sheepishly.

"Thanks, but no thanks. I have some homework I need to do. Sorry about the ruckus," Kyoya said as he reached out for some books and managed to grab some without moving from his spot.

"Well, if you need anything, don't hesitate to call me, son. I'll be downstairs if you need me," Jiroemon said, finally conceding defeat. He stood up and with a small smile, he left Kyoya's room, closing the door behind him.

But what Kyoya didn't know was that after he closed the door, he didn't leave right off. He looked down at the purplish red rug below him, his green eyes becoming a little sad. His eyesight blurred a little. He put a hand on his face and finally left to go downstairs.

Once Kyoya heard him going down the stairs, he exhaled a big sigh of relief. He didn't see the pink creature. If he saw that freaky little thing walking and talking, he'd freak out to high heaven. But as soon as Kyoya finished his sigh of relief, the creature sprawled out from under the bed and hopped right back onto it. She was NOT happy, and neither was Kyoya.

"That was so mean! Why'd you have to smush me under the bed like I'm some pile of dirty clothes?! I believe everyone deserves to marvel at my astonishingly stunning beauty and good looks!" The creature asked petulantly like a spoiled little rich girl, pushing one of her long ears behind her like a fashion model.

"Because if they saw a stuffed animal walking and talking, they'd flip out. That's why. Also, who and what the heck are you supposed to be anyway?" Kyoya asked as he moved some books out of his way and pulled himself back onto his manual wheelchair.

"Heehee! I'm glad you asked! It'd be ever so impolite to not introduce myself, so I might as well!" The pink creature exclaimed rather cutely, her rosy cheeks donning a raspberry red hue, her lilac eyes twinkling like stars, and striking a cute stuffed animal-like pose. "My name is Lovebeam! Aren't I the cutest little fairy you've ever seen in your whole entire life?"

'_Make my teeth rot, why don't you?'_ Kyoya thought sarcastically, miffed by the fairy's rather saccharine introduction. He had to wonder if she was presenting herself in an overly cutesy manner to make him either pity her or let down his guard. It wasn't going to work. He crossed his arms, unfazed by her cutesy-poo saccharine-ness. "Okay, Lovebeam...I just wanna ask you...if you're _really_ a fairy, how come you don't have any wings?" He asked sarcastically, with some snark tipping his tongue.

"I dunno. Nobody said it was a rule for fairies to have wings!" Lovebeam retorted. She shrugged her shoulders. "You humans and your absolutely terrible tendency to stereotype everything."

'_Yeah! Speaking of stereotypes, you're obviously little miss froo-froo spoiled brat who whines incarnate! And don't talk to ME about stereotyping!'_ Kyoya yelled in his head. "Where are you from, and why are you even on Earth?"

"Ohh! That's right! I remember! My sisters and I tried to stop this rogue human from coming here and wreaking havoc, like he did on our home planet Rozaniela, but he attacked us and…" It was here that Lovebeam's ears began to droop, and the twinkle in her lavender eyes began to fade as she looked down at Kyoya's bedspread sadly. "...we got separated. I've searched for them left and right, but I haven't found a single one of them!" Her eyes began to look like they're about to burst into tears. "I've been alone all this time! I can't stand the thought of something terrible happening to them! I'm so worried about them, and they must be ever so worried about poor little me! Oh, where oh where did they goooo?! I miss them so muuuuch!" Finally, Lovebeam began wailing. She certainly looked very pitiful indeed. Although Kyoya's irritability got replaced with some sympathy and pity for the pink animal fairy thing, he's still flummoxed. Who wouldn't be? It's not normal to see a cute pink stuffed animal talking and walking.

"Hey. Don't cry, Lovebeam. If you want, I'd be more than happy to help you look for your sisters," Kyoya told her softly, in a kind, sympathetic voice, which immediately made Lovebeam's tearful display disappear. Her sad expression was replaced with radiant joy.

"Really?! You will?! Oh, thank you, young human! I'm ever so sorry I thought you were a villain before!" Lovebeam exclaimed happily, jumping up and down like a child who was promised dessert. But she stopped as soon as she saw Kyoya's closet, the door wide open, revealing some of his clothes. Typical boy clothes, like long jeans, long shorts, hoodies, sweaters, and some short sleeved shirts with lots of artsy looking designs on them. She zipped into the closet and suddenly began ripping the clothes off of their hangers.

"Ewww! You may be chivalrous, but you obviously have absolutely zero taste in fashion! Look at these monstrosities! This closet seriously needs a major head-to-toe makeover!" Lovebeam shouted as she scoffed at Kyoya's clothes and began throwing them around his room like rag dolls.

Kyoya's previous irritability came right back as he grabbed the fairy by the ears and stopped her from throwing more of his clothes around. "Hey! Don't you know it's rude to go into people's closets and throw their clothes around?! For someone who's going through a family crisis, you sure are rude!" Kyoya snapped.

Lovebeam's sad, googly-eyed face came back. "Ooooh! How mean! You said you'd help me find my sisters! How can you be so bold as to treat poor, pitiful little me this way?! If anyone's rude, it's you!" Lovebeam wailed petulantly like she was being framed for a crime she didn't commit.

"There's a difference between being rude and putting your foot down, y'know! And don't think the little woe-is-me act is gonna work on me!" Kyoya exclaimed. Suddenly, Lovebeam pried her ears out of his hands, pulled out a bunch of his drawers, and began yanking clothes out of there left and right, not listening to anything he just said.

"HEY! Quit it, you!" Kyoya tried to stop her from messing up his room more, but some piles of clothes got thrown on him, taking him a while to take them off one by one. Lovebeam didn't even look like she noticed he was there anymore. _'God, this thing's a little brat!'_ Kyoya screamed in his head.

"Ew! Ugly! Tacky! Gross! Too green! Too camouflage-y! Too stiff! Too lively!" Lovebeam mused as she rummaged through Kyoya's bureau, unabashedly leaving drawers wide open and throwing clothes around the entire room, turning it into a very messy laundromat. Finally, Kyoya got all the clothes off of him, rolled over to the oblivious pink fairy, and grabbed her by the ears.

"Didn't anyone teach you any manners?!" Kyoya shouted, finally having enough of Lovebeam's antics. "Fine then! Clean up this mess right now, or I won't help you look for your sisters! Do you understand me, young lady?!" He shouted sternly, putting his foot down, hoping Lovebeam will finally take the hint and stop messing up his room. Lovebeam didn't answer right off, as she looked quite flabbergasted, just like Kyoya when she first appeared in his room.

Finally, she pouted. "Fine. I was only trying to improve your wardrobe. You didn't have to be so mean to poor little me!" Lovebeam pouted as she reluctantly but obediently cleaned up the mess she made, gently picking up every piece of clothing she threw around.

She neatly folded some and put them back in the drawers. Others she put back on the hangers in the closet. Kyoya picked up some of the books she dropped, not wanting her to slip and fall. Finally, Kyoya's room is back to the way it was. But Lovebeam wasn't happy. She sat on Kyoya's bed with her lips sticking out and her stubby little arms crossed.

"I'm hungry," Lovebeam muttered.

Kyoya smiled. "Since you cleaned up my room nicely, I'll get you something to eat as a reward," Kyoya said as he wheeled out of his room.

"I may be hungry, but I want something nice, like a pretty dress with lots of ribbons and bows and frills and embroidered lace!" Lovebeam complained to the air as Kyoya left the room, happy to finally get away from her screechy whining, even for a little bit. He couldn't help but giggle as he left the room and went downstairs. After that, he got in his electric wheelchair and wheeled into the kitchen to grab something for her to eat. He decided on some crackers, fruit bars, and a pack of apple juice. As he got whatever food he figured Lovebeam would eat (or probably hate), he overheard his parents talking in another room.

"I'm going to pay some bills real quick, honey," Jiroemon told his wife, who looked a little worried.

"Jiro...you look sad. Tell me what's wrong," Kayoko implored sweetly but sadly.

"It's nothing," He said as he went for the door.

"Please don't keep blaming yourself for what happened! You didn't know!" Kayoko exclaimed in a worried tone of voice, which made him stop in his tracks. "You didn't know that drunk driver was coming right at us. How can we even know something like that? It's not like humans can see into the future!"

"It's not about that drunk driver!" Jiroemon exclaimed bitterly as he closed the door behind him. Kyoya, not wanting to interrupt, put the snacks in his pockets and climbed the stairs back to his room on all fours.

* * *

"I can't believe it's finally happening to me!" Riko twirled around her room in a state of absolute bliss. Moonbeam couldn't help but smile as she watched her friend jump around her room happily.

"What do you plan on doing with them when they arrive?" Moonbeam asked curiously, her long ears standing up, pointing to the ceiling.

"That's easy! We're gonna play games, watch anime, read manga, and talk about anything we can think of! But we're not gonna talk about clothes or boys or nail polish or makeup or gossip or any of that stupid icky girly stuff!" Riko exclaimed happily as she slumped onto the floor and began drawing more pictures, filling in some uncolored spots with a pink colored pencil. "Eeeek! I'm sooooo happy! I can't believe one of my dreams is finally coming true! I have actual friends, and they're actually coming over my house to hang out! Just dreaming about it makes me wanna explode like a huge cloud of cherry blossom petals being carried by the spring breeze! When I was younger, I used to always be jealous of my classmates. They always had friends and invited them over to their houses to do fun stuff together. Everyone always told me that someone as stupid as me can never have friends, and that no sane person would ever want to go to a weirdo's house," Riko exclaimed happily at first, then becoming a little sad as she colored in some more uncolored spots.

"You're not any of those things. I think you're a nice person, and I'm sure you'll have a great time when they come over. But whenever my sisters and I had friends over, my parents always told us that since our friends were coming over, we have to think about them and what they want. Just some helpful advice: if they come over, ask questions like "Would you like anything to eat or drink? What games do you want to play? What books do you want to read? Is there anything I can do for you?" Not a whole lot, but I just don't want your get-together to get ruined," Moonbeam explained kindly.

"It's okay. Thanks for that. I'll try and keep those in mind," Riko said as she finished coloring in some uncolored spots with her colored pencils. After that, she found herself squealing again. "I can't stop being happy! I want tomorrow to come already!" Riko shouted as she stood up, grabbed one of her cute cat-eared hats and put it on her head. She curled her hands up like cat paws and struck a pose. "Meow! Kitty Riko's got friends now!"

Moonbeam couldn't help but giggle. Not in a mean way, of course. In fact, she was happy for Riko. She had seen Riko be happy before, but never to an extent like this. It warmed Moonbeam's heart to see the happy young girl jump around the room with her cat eared hat, pretending to be a cat out of sheer happiness.

"Stop being weird right now!" Rina's loud, high voice suddenly made Riko freeze in her tracks, almost tripping on the floor had she not grasped her bed just in time. Riko's hat fell onto the bed as soon as she stopped moving to turn to the entrance of her room, her eyes laying upon a stern looking Rina, with her little arms crossed.

Moonbeam went into stuffed animal mode, not wanting the stern looking girl to find out her true identity or, worst of all, ask Riko questions about it. As soon as Riko saw Rina come into her room uninvited, her previous joy dissipated, getting replaced with irritation.

"Jeez, Rina! You scared the living daylights outta me! Don't you know it's rude to waltz into someone else's room?!" Riko shouted, her eyes wide with anger, understandably perturbed by Rina's sudden entrance and screechy shouting just now.

"It's even more rude to pretend you're a cat even though you're old enough to know it's stupid and dumb and weird to do that! It's even more rude to tell lies, like you did with Mom just now!" Rina retorted petulantly, not showing any desire to back down.

"You mean me having friends over? I'm not lying about that, y'know," Riko said, crossing her own arms, with a contorted face that looked insulted by Rina's accusatory attitude.

"You don't have any friends! You're weird and stupid and dumb and not normal like me! Listen up! Nobody's allowed to come here if you're around! You're just gonna be weird and cry over stupid stuff and ruin everything and make us all look bad!" Rina exclaimed.

Moonbeam couldn't believe what she was hearing. She knew from what Riko told her that Rina was a self-absorbed, mouthy little brat, but she never knew the little seven-year-old could be so bold as to say those mean things to Riko right to her face! _'Jeez, Riko's right! This girl IS a brat! Just like Lovebeam! She calls Riko rude, but she's even ruder! How can she say that stuff to her older sister?! And why does she act like she knows Riko better than Riko herself does?'_

Riko, on the other hand, was not deterred. "Quit acting like you're the boss around here! You shouldn't say stuff like that. It's very rude! And I actually DO have friends. You just haven't met them!"

"Are they imaginary friends? Grow up, Riko! That stuff is for babies, just like those baby anime you watch like Moomins(1) and Maple Town! But then again, your brain will never grow up since you're stupid and dumb and babyish and weird and not normal like me!" Rina insinuated loudly and passionately for all to hear.

'_I know Sunbeam would want to deck her in a heartbeat,'_ Moonbeam thought, trying desperately to fight the urge to get out of fake stuffed animal mode and give this snotty little brat a good scolding. She knew beyond the shadow of a doubt Sunbeam would do exactly that.

But as it turned out Moonbeam didn't have to.

"Ri-NAAA!" Hikage suddenly popped out of nowhere and said her name in a warning voice, making her turn around aghast.

"Hikage! Uhh…" Rina stammered, trying to find some way to avert Hikage's piercing, stern gaze. She pointed to Riko like she caught her committing a crime. "Riko's being weird again! She should know better!"

"YOU should know better than to pick on your older sister, Rina," Sadly for Rina, it didn't work. Not at all. This made her stare down at the floor ruefully, twisting a ruffle of her skirt around between her stubby little fingers. "Is Riko being happy really so bad to you, Rina? It's bad enough you pick on and call her mean names every day, like you're doing just now! Now you're trying to tell her to cancel her get-together just because you don't like it? That's not nice, Rina. It's very rude and inconsiderate," Hikage told her sternly, not averting his austere gaze one bit.

"But you know what she's like! She's just gonna be weird and ruin everything and make people talk bad about us!" Rina exclaimed petulantly.

"I KNOW what she's like, but that doesn't make it right for you to give her a bad time, and that definitely doesn't it make it right for you to act like you have to be the one to decide things around here. You should be happy Riko's inviting friends over, not telling her to cancel it just because it'll be convenient for you! How would YOU like it if I told you not to have friends over because I didn't like it? Now go to your room! You'll be in time out for ten minutes!" Hikage told her even more strictly, pointing in the direction of her room upon finishing.

"But-"

"No ifs, ands, or buts young lady! I don't want to hear another word of it! Now go to your room right now, missy! You're in there for ten minutes!" Hikage stamped his foot and raised his voice a little higher and stricter this time, managing to scare Rina into dashing into her room. "And don't even THINK about sneaking out!" He added before exhaling a sigh of relief. He turned to Riko, smiled sweetly, and walked over to her. They both sat down on her bed, but not before Riko moved Moonbeam to the side so she wouldn't get sat on.

"Sorry about that. You okay?" Hikage asked kindly, lowering his voice to his usual soft, kind and cheery tone. Riko grabbed another stuffed animal, a bigger one this time, and squeezed it a little tightly, hoping to squeeze the bad feelings out of her system. "You don't have to listen to her. She just thinks picking on you will make her life better. I think it's great you finally have friends and are gonna invite them over. I can't wait to meet them. You've gone on and on about them, and I remember you always used to be so jealous of me whenever I had friends over."

"Does she know?"

"Huh?"

"Does Rina know I'm...autistic?" Riko muttered shyly, wondering if she was wrong in asking that question. Hikage put his hand in Riko's raven black hair and stroke it.

"I don't know. Probably not the full extent of it. I think Mom and Dad are planning to explain it to her when she's old enough to really understand. But I think they need to do it now, because I don't want her growing up believing that all people who have Autism do nothing but throw tantrums and cry a lot and don't talk and make messes. There's lots of successful people out there who are autistic and don't let their disability get the better of them. But anyway, I'd really love to meet your friends. They seem like nice people from what you've told me. If you want, I'd be more than happy to help you out in giving them a good time. I don't have soccer practice tomorrow, so I'll be home right after three," Hikage explained kindly.

Riko looked up at him and smiled. "Thanks, Oniichan. You're always nice to me, even though...I do kinda ruin stuff for you too."

"What are you talking about? You don't ruin everything for me! I'm glad you're my little sister! Come here, you!" Hikage laughed as he wrapped his long arms around Riko, pulled her onto his lap, and nuzzled her like she's hugging a stuffed animal, making Riko laugh.

"Hey! Quit it, Niichan!"

"Come on! Admit it, you like it!" Hikage retorted as he nuzzled her some more. Soon, he stopped, and Riko sat back on her bed. "Seriously, don't take what Rina says too seriously. She's just mouthy like that. If she ever calls you names or picks on you, tell me and I'll be sure to knock some sense into her."

"But she never listens."

"Then I'll make her listen. That's what brothers do! Keep their little siblings in line and teach them right!"

"A single file line?" Riko asked, making Hikage giggle right out loud.

"Good one, Ri-chan!" Hikage croaked through his laughter, which made Riko confused.

'_Hikage's really nice. He's a great big brother,'_ Moonbeam thought, happy to see Hikage be supportive and play with his little sister. _'Sunbeam and Starbeam are like that too. But still...I wonder if Lovebeam is doing okay?'_ Moonbeam thought again with some mild worry creeping into her heart.

* * *

Jiroemon left the red brick city hall with a frown on his rugged face, eyes downcast. He sat on a nearby bench after getting out and pushed his hands through his thick hair as he let out an exasperated sigh. He then looked back up at the pristine blue sky above him, taking note of some very small, wispy white clouds aimlessly floating by without a care in the world, just like everything else going on.

Cars were zipping back and forth on the street, some taking U-turns. People bustled about going to wherever it is they were all going to. Some birds flew and danced around some trees, happily and merrily twittering and singing their lovely songs like usual. He couldn't help but wish he was carefree like those little birds. They sure were lucky to fly around and do whatever they wanted without feeling bogged down by anything.

After a short while, he got into the car and drove away. But just turning the ignition made Jiroemon's chest tighten. He could feel some sweat on his face. For a moment he thought he was going into a panic attack. He wanted to just go back home and be with Kyoya, the son he couldn't protect. He wanted go to home and help him with everything, but he knew Kyoya wouldn't like that.

"_Don't worry about me, Dad. I'll be fine."_

"_I don't like having people do everything for me. They make it look like I can't do stuff all by myself. Don't you just hate that?"_

"_Quit worrying, Dad! I just fell, that's all. See? Not a scratch on me!"_

"_I can do this myself. I can handle it. Don't you have to go to work?"_

"_I'll be fine, Dad! I've practiced!"_

He wanted to respect his son's determination. He knew he couldn't baby him, but a wave of guilt still consumed his heart. _'He's so strong, and he's managed to overcome so much...but I'm the reason he's the way he is...how can he forgive me so easily?'_ Jiroemon thought as he drove, trying to pay attention to his surroundings. He shook his head and tried to shake off the guilt and the anxiety. But as he turned a corner and proceeded to drive up on a little hill, he saw a figure in a crimson red cape meandering about, looking confused and frazzled.

Curious, he stopped the car on a safe part of the street and got out. Upon closer inspection, the figure in the red cape was a teenager, with long silver hair that went down to his shoulders. Was it a girl? The teenager had pale white skin, and was dressed in a short sleeved black shirt, black pants, a gold diadem with leaves on it, tall bloody red boots, a lavender purple neck ruffle, and fingerless black gloves.

But as Jiroemon got closer, he noticed the child looked focused on something. He peered closer to find that the child is looking at a magazine. One about houses. The child is rubbing it's head with one of it's hands and grunting loudly in frustration, stamping one of its feet.

"Ugh! I can't make heads or tails of any of this garbage! Why can these idiots read this stuff better than me?!" The child yelled in what appeared to be an unusually high pitched, prepubescent boy voice. The boy looked to be of the age where he should be in high school.

"Excuse me. Do you need any help?" Jiroemon asked kindly. The boy turned around and gave the concerned Jiroemon a very insinuating and angry look with his red eyes.

"No, I don't need any help! Get outta my way, you trash!" The boy yelled vehemently and threw the magazine right at Jiroemon's face like it was trash.

Jiroemon took a few steps back, cowed by the silver haired child's extremely rude response. How can a child his age talk that way to an adult, especially since he's just asking if he needs any help? After that, the boy spat at the grass, leaving a big gob of spit dripping on some blades of grass.

"Meh. I'm bored," The boy muttered.

* * *

Kyoya and Lovebeam went out into their backyard for some fresh air, but when the bratty little pink fairy flew out into the open environment, her long ears suddenly shot up into the air, looking straighter than a plank. Her lilac eyes widened to the point where they resembled saucers, filling with fear. Kyoya couldn't help but notice when he heard Lovebeam yelp.

"What's wrong, Lovebeam?" Kyoya asked.

"I feel an evil presence! It might be him!" Lovebeam exclaimed fearfully.

"Who do you mean by him?" Kyoya asked again, becoming concerned this time.

"Zenjin! That kid who ruined my home planet and separated me from my sisters! I have to go!" Lovebeam shouted and tried to flutter away, but Kyoya managed to grip one of her long ears in the nick of time.

"Wait! Calm down! You said he ruined your planet, right? He might be too strong for you to handle!" Kyoya pleaded, hoping to persuade her to fall back, but the persistent little fairy still tried her hardest to fly despite one of her ears in his grip.

"I know that! But he might be hurting my sisters, and I have to save them! Don't try to stop me!" Lovebeam wailed as she struggled to break free of his grasp, her pudgy little cotton candy pink face contorting with both worry for her sisters, fear of the evil presence, and a little bit of pain from one of her ears still in his grasp.

Weirdly enough, instead of breaking free, she actually managed to move quite a distance despite Kyoya's hand being wrapped around her ear...and funnily enough, she dragged Kyoya, wheelchair and all, right along with her. Kyoya's wheelchair had a seatbelt on it wrapped firmly around his waist, keeping him in place.

"Lovebeam! You can't! It's too dangerous!" Kyoya pleaded again, keeping a firm grip on one of her ears, without any intent on letting her go. He couldn't help but wonder why he was so concerned about this little pink, droopy eared fairy when all she's done is act like a spoiled brat and ruin his room? Why was he showing concern for her? He didn't know, but Lovebeam sounded dead serious when she mentioned this Zenjin person.

"I don't care! My sisters need me!" Lovebeam whined as she found herself flying through the backyard gate, dragging Kyoya right along with her, although he was still using the joystick to maneuver it to make it easier not just on him, but on her as well, since he didn't want her to get hurt dragging him around.

* * *

Around that time, Moonbeam felt the evil presence too, and Riko immediately called Anzu, Hotaru, and Marina to tell them that a Corrupt Sentinel may be nearby. Riko transformed into Cure Twilight before letting Moonbeam lead the way. Soon, Cure Twilight met up with the four other Pretty Cures in the area where they saw Zenjin, who was successful in yanking out the man's soul, corrupting it, and turning it into a gigantic black frog. The black frog, much to their surprise, wasn't as big as the other Corrupt Sentinels they fought, but that didn't make it any less dangerous.

"Hey, Human Trash! Go crazy! Go wild! Wreak all the havoc you want!" Zenjin cheered with a vicious smile on his face, his crimson eyes wide with a kind of odd, childish joy. He didn't care that an unconscious man was right next to him, skin pale and Soul Portal exposed for all to see.

"Can you NOT call them Human Trash?! It's mean and offensive!" Cure Twilight yelled.

"Shut up! They're my creations and I can name them whatever the heck I want! Get over it!" Zenjin snapped rudely.

"RIBBIT!" The giant frog leaped on a nearby tree. The tree was really thin, and it couldn't handle the frog's weight, so it snapped and fell on a telephone line, snapping it in half, sending electric blue sparks of electricity flying around. The frog didn't care. After that, it's long, black tongue shot out of its mouth, wrapping itself around a little bird that couldn't fly away in time.

"NO! Twilight Sparkle!" Cure Twilight quickly shot out from her hiding spot, got her Twilight Ring out, and threw it at the frog's tongue like a boomerang. Unfortunately, it simply bounced off, and didn't make any scratches on it. But it did make the frog cry out in pain to the point where the tongue unwrapped itself from the bird, allowing it to fly away.

"RIBBIT!" The frog cried out upon laying eyes on a courageous Cure Twilight, it's round, bloody red eyes glowing with anger, just like Zenjin's.

"Quit ruining my fun!" Zenjin yelled angrily, annoyed by the entrance of the Pretty Cures.

"Fat chance, bucko! Dusk Fire Punch!" Cure Dusk shouted as both of her fists suddenly burst into blazing orange flames, right as she leaped in front of Zenjin to try and land some punches on him. Unfortunately, he raised his hands in front of her fists and made a glowing red barrier around himself.

Cure Dawn got her nunchucks out, did a back flip in the sky and tried to land a Dawn Slam attack on the giant frog, but it leaped out of the way and onto the roof of a house, causing her to hit the broken tree instead. But she recovered quickly and jumped onto the roof of the house it landed on. Cure Twilight joined her and they both held hands as they leaped into the air, landing some hard kicks on the frog's face, knocking it off of the roof and spiraling down a steep street.

"Get it!" Starbeam shouted as the Pretty Cures all ran down the street to chase after the frog, which landed into a little park right at the bottom of it, leaving Zenjin all alone, not that he cared.

"Starlight Kick!" Cure Starlight was the first to deliver another elegant kick, this time on the frog's abdomen, causing it to release a very pained and vociferous croak which mad Cure Twilight cover her ears in fright. All of a sudden, the frog's tongue shot out from it's large, hippo-like mouth, wrapping itself around a frazzled Cure Dusk and lifting her into the air.

"Dusk!" Cure Twilight, snapping herself out of her moment of weakness, leaped into the air and grabbed onto the frog's incredibly sticky and slimy tail. The frog's saliva stuck to her like glue, and she didn't like how drippy, wet, and sticky it felt against her skin, but she wasn't going to let Cure Dusk get eaten by a frog.

Once she got close enough, she drew out her long silver claws and slashed the frog's tongue, causing it to let out an even louder, even more pained croak. Finally free from its tongue, Cure Dusk landed safely on her feet, with the wings on her shoes fluttering to help break the fall.

"Thanks, Twilight!" Cure Dusk exclaimed happily, with a warm, energetic looking smile as she held her hand out for a high five. Cure Twilight felt her heart go warm. She did something right for once, and Marina isn't angry at her! She withdrew one of her claws and happily smacked Marina's hand. It stung when they made contact, but it wasn't as bad as Riko thought it'd be.

"_It's my fault! It's my fault my son's the way he is now!"_ The frog wailed as it leaped out of the park and tried to go further, but Cure Dawn hopped right in front of it.

"Golden Dawn Explosion!" A huge dome of golden light shot right out from Cure Dawn in all directions, blinding the frog and sending it rolling across the concrete pavement. The frog didn't get up right off.

"_I should have packed a spare tire! I should have changed the tires before we went out! If I did either of those, my son wouldn't have been hurt, and he wouldn't have been paralyzed! We could have avoided that drunk driver!"_ The frog wailed again as it struggled to get back on it's long, webbed, froggy feet.

"Dusk Medley!" Not wanting to give it a chance to get up, Cure Dusk released orange, fire covered musical notes from her fists, shooting them at the frog, which, instead of enduring them, used whatever's left of its tongue to knock them all away! One fiery musical note wound up hitting a nearby house, breaking the glass on one of the windows.

"Oh no!" Cure Twilight yelped upon seeing the fiery musical note shatter the glass. She heard screaming come from the house. But before she could do anything, the frog finally got back on its feet and tried to leap onto Cure Twilight. She didn't even see it behind her, and she would have gotten squished had Cure Dawn not slam it away with her nunchucks.

"Dawn Nunchucks!" Cure Dawn shouted as she smacked the giant frog so hard it went flying back toward the park, crushing a swing set, leaving it as flat as a pancake. Cure Twilight had to cover her ears because it was so loud.

"Sorry about that, Twilight!" Cure Dawn exclaimed.

"That's okay! Thanks for saving me, An-chan!" Cure Twilight replied, uncovering one of her ears and waving at Cure Dawn as thanks for saving her from being squashed. Right behind her, a mother and her two young children scrambled out of the house with the broken window, knowing that they had to make a break for it or else they'd dead.

"_I'm sorry...I'm sorry…I'm sorry I couldn't protect you…"_ The frog wailed sadly as it tried to leap on Cure Starlight, who managed to evade it and land a punch right in the face. She soon got her naginata out and tried to slash it, but then it managed to evade it just like she did earlier.

"Twilight-" Cure Twilight was about to use her Twilight Serenade on it, but she found herself struck by an odd blow to her back, causing her to be sent rolling across the pavement, leaving dirt and some fresh scratches on her arms in the process.

"Hey! Leave Riko alone, you bully!" Sunbeam screamed at Zenjin. One of his hands is glowing in a bloody, crimson red light, which pretty much incriminated him on the spot, not that he cared.

"Just let the frog do what it wants! It's fun to watch it hop all over the place and destroy everything!" Zenjin sneered.

"You think corrupting people's souls and making them kill people and destroy stuff is fun?! And hurting people?! You're heartless!" Sunbeam yelled.

"Do I look like I care, you little rat?" Zenjin asked in a monotone voice as he threw another ball of red energy at them, just like he did Cure Twilight. Unlike with her, however, the three fairies created a glowing yellow dome-like barrier around themselves just like how Zenjin did earlier, protecting themselves from the beam of energy. What he didn't know was that Cures Starlight and Dawn passed right by him to get to the top of the really steep street.

Cure Twilight struggled to get herself back on her feet. Her back jolted with pain the minute she even tried to move, but she put up with it and managed to get herself back on her feet. "Oww…" She muttered as she tried to rub her back with her hand. Then she took note of the gravel and scratches on her arms. She wiped off the gravel while being careful not to get any into the fresh scratches lest they get infected, if they're not infected already. "I really need to get better at this…"

"Please, stop, Lovebeam! They might not even be there! You're gonna get hurt!" A voice suddenly shouted from some nearby bushes.

"I have to see if it's them! I have to check, right?!" Another voice, much girlier and much higher pitched, shouted back in a very worried and concerned voice.

The second voice, Cure Twilight didn't recognize. Nobody she knew sounded like that. But the first voice sounded very familiar. She'd recognize it from a mile away. Fear began to consume her heart. She wished it wasn't who she thought it was.

And it was.

Out from the bushes came a pink, long eared fairy with a pale orange ribbon around its neck. But it was who was with her that made Cure Twilight suddenly shout with surprise.

"Kyo-chan?!"

Yes, Kyoya, with a hand firmly gripped one the pink creature's long, floppy ears, stopped paying attention and turned toward Cure Twilight upon hearing his nickname. An awkward silence crept in between them, allowing Kyoya's grip on the fairy's ear to finally loosen, giving her the opportunity to finally get the heck out of there.

"...Riko?" Kyoya muttered, his eyes wide as saucers, unable to comprehend the fact that this purple cat eared girl was right in front of him, plus the fact that she called him Kyo-chan.

Only Riko and his mother called him that.

Riko found her entire being frozen with the ice of anxiety and fear. _'OH NOOO! He's found me out! He's gonna think I'm a freak and that I caused all the destruction like everybody else even though I'm trying to help and he'll decide he doesn't want to be my friend anymoooore! Whaddo I doooooo?!'_

"Cure Twilight! Come on! Your powers are required to return the amphibian back to its original state!" Starbeam implored as she and her two sisters floated over to the anxiety frozen Cure Twilight, not quite noticing Kyoya there until he himself let out a yelp.

"Whoa! There's more of you?!" Kyoya yelped, which caused the three fairies and Lovebeam to make eye contact. It didn't take long for even them to yelp, this time out of joy.

"My sisteeeers!" Lovebeam wailed, zipping away from Kyoya.

"Lovebeeeeam!" The three fairies shouted joyfully, flying away from Cure Twilight and unknowingly yanking her out of her fear and anxiety filled reverie.

Overjoyed, Lovebeam and her three younger sisters floated toward each other and partook in a group hug, squealing joyfully over their reunion. Cure Twilight and Kyoya, surprised as they are, couldn't help but smile upon seeing them rejoice in their heartfelt reunion, with all smiles and expressions of intense relief.

"We're together again!" Moonbeam exclaimed tearfully.

"I missed you all so much!" Lovebeam piped in just as tearfully but happily as she embraced her sisters.

"We were ever so worried about you!" Starbeam crooned.

"I'm so glad you're alright!" Sunbeam edicted happily.

Unfortunately for them, a giant shadow loomed over them. Cure Twilight knew it came from above. When she looked up, she found a big, black, frog-legged mass about to fall right on top of them and squish them to the point where they looked like pancakes. Without any fear, as soon as the frog got close enough, she landed a massive punch. It was so strong that the frog got sent flying up the steep street and landed right on the top of it.

"Woohoo! Take that, froggy!" Cure Twilight cheered as she pumped her fists into the air and jumped around, rejoicing over the fact that she managed to protect Kyoya and the four fairy sisters. Even Kyoya couldn't help but be impressed since he was all smiles.

"That was awesome! Thanks!" Kyoya exclaimed gratefully despite feeling quite frazzled by all the craziness going on. Cure Twilight flashed her own smile and gave him a thumbs up, like the previous fear and anxiety that overtook her seconds before never had a grip on her in the first place.

"You're welcome!" Cure Twilight mused sweetly.

"Hey! We saved the guy and his Soul Portal!" Cure Dawn exclaimed as she and Cure Starlight leaped down from the steep street with the unconscious man's body and Soul Portal safely in their arms. Cure Dawn was about to say something more until her eyes widened upon making eye contact with Kyoya to the point where she almost dropped the man had she not collected herself quickly. _'Oh God! What's Mitomo doing here?! It's too dangerous for him to stick around! He didn't find us out, did he?!'_ Anzu thought fearfully.

"Thank goodness you saved him!" Cure Twilight exclaimed, exhaling a sigh of relief.

"We figured we needed to get him out of harm's way-" Cure Starlight was about to explain until someone cut her off.

"DAD!" That yell came right out of Kyoya's mouth. His eyes are back to being wide with shock as he wheeled over to the blue and yellow Pretty Cures. "What happened to him?!"

"Wait, WHAT?!" Cure Twilight yelped, her voice going up an octave, something she thought wasn't possible. "This guy's your dad?! Then that means…!"

"_I'm sorry...I'm sorry! I could have prevented this! I could have changed the tires before we left! I'm sorry you're paralyzed because of my mistake!"_ The frog wailed as it tried to eat the leaves off of a nearby tree, giving Cure Dusk ample time to unleash a Fiery Dusk Arrow on it. The flaming arrow managed to hit the frog right on it's back, but it didn't stop it from eating a good chunk of leaves from the tree.

"Oh God...that giant frog isn't him, is it?!" Kyoya mused upon hearing the frog's woeful cries. If the giant frog really was his father, then, it might be possible that...

"Twilight, take him to a safe place, then come back so we can purify Frogger here!" Cure Dawn commanded as she and Starlight set him down in front of an untouched tree. Twilight nodded and wheeled him away.

"Hey! That's my dad!" Kyoya protested as Cure Twilight wheeled him away.

"I know. His soul has been taken from his body, corrupted, and turned into that giant frog. But we'll turn him back to normal! I promise! Just stay here! I don't want you to get hurt or even killed! If you died, your dad might have more reason to blame himself!" Cure Twilight reasoned once she got him to a safe part of the street.

Kyoya couldn't help but look down at his knees. She made a really good point. But he did feel somewhat better knowing exactly what happened. Plus, maybe it would be better if he stayed out of harm's way.

"Ohhh! Leave it to me! I'll distract it!" Lovebeam proclaimed proudly as she broke from the embraces of her tearful yet relieved sisters and zipped toward the giant frog.

"Lovebeam! No!" Moonbeam called out.

But Lovebeam already managed to approach the giant frog monster. "Hey, you! Giant froggy! Bet'cha can't catch little ol' meeeee!" Lovebeam teased as she flitted around the frog's face like an annoying housefly.

"Lovebeam, get back!" Sunbeam commanded, but the pink, floppy eared fairy didn't listen one bit. Soon, the frog stopped eating leaves and began chasing her while completely hopping on other houses, causing roof tiles to fall and leaving big holes on them.

"Lovebeam! Stop! You're exacerbating the gravity of the situation!" Starbeam yelled as she proceeded to chase Lovebeam and the giant frog down. Thankfully for Starbeam, Lovebeam stopped in her tracks...right on top of the roof of one house.

"No I'm not! I'm helping you girls out!" Lovebeam complained petulantly until she saw a giant shadow loom over her. Looking up, she saw the giant frog about to jump on her until Cure Twilight swooped in and scooped the pink fairy in her arms just in the nick of time, using the wings on her shoes to float back down to the pavement. Soon, the frog leaped back onto the street.

"Now, girls!" Cure Twilight commanded, and the quartet readied their weapons.

"Twilight Serenade!" A purple ray of light consumed the giant black frog.

"Starlight Shower!" A shower of glowing blue stars rained onto the black frog.

"Dawn Flame!" Spinning her nunchucks rapidly, a golden yellow flame flew out and consumed the giant frog, causing it to croak in excruciating pain.

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Dusk readied her arrow, and then let go, allowing the arrow to shoot into the giant frog's skin, with the orange flames mixing with Cure Dawn's yellow flames, charring it to the point where it dissolved into nothing but charred ash.

The attacks faded, leaving behind a crimson red orb. Quickly, Cure Twilight grabbed it and dropped it back into Jiroemon's Soul Portal. The color returned to his skin, and he found himself waking up.

"Dad! Dad!" Kyoya yelled, thinking it safe to come out. He wheeled over to his partially conscious father with worry written all over his round face. "Dad! You okay?! Answer me!" Kyoya pleaded as he tried to reach down and wake his father, but his arm didn't reach since he's still in his wheelchair, seatbelt fastened and all.

"What the-?! What's HE doing here?!" Marina yelped, her golden eyes wide with shock, suddenly taking note of Kyoya's unprecedented presence. Anzu facepalmed and shook her head. Kyoya didn't bother to pay any attention.

The girls, who transformed back to their normal selves, were about to leave until they noticed Zenjin standing about a few feet away, with the same look Kyoya had when he discovered Cure Twilight...only he looked more like he saw the most horrible thing ever. His eyes became extremely wide to the point where his crimson irises looked very much like little tiny pimples. His face, already white as a sheet, became even paler in color, his hands and legs trembled with fear, and his whole body is wracked with horror, all because his crimson eyes are on Kyoya, still worriedly begging his father to wake up, struggling to undo his seatbelt so he can reach further.

This wound up presenting a very big opportunity for Sunbeam. "Hey, Zenjin! Time for you to get some well deserved comeuppance!" Sunbeam yelled as she flitted toward Zenjin in an attempt to give him a beatdown and get revenge for the cruel things he said to her.

Unfortunately for her, he didn't even bother to notice her this time. He zipped right past her like he's about to attack someone. As it turns out, he was. But he didn't attack any of the girls or Jiroemon.

Kyoya finally managed to get down on the concrete only to find himself receiving a very strong blow to his face, knocking him away and causing him to roll on the pavement. The girls gasped with horror. Before he could get up and see what, or who, punched him just now, he suddenly found himself unable to breathe. He could feel a set of fingers digging into his neck and himself being lifted into the air. He opened his eyes and looked down to find Zenjin, with both hands gripping his neck, digging into the skin without any mercy, the silver haired boy's teeth grinding and crimson red eyes completely bloodshot, brimming with absolutely nothing but undiluted rancor and malice.

"YOU SHOULDN'T EXIST!" Zenjin yelled in his highest voice possible, and it was dripping with hostility and hatred for his bespectacled redhead. Riko covered her ears, but courage blazed in her heart. "I DID AWAY WITH YOU LONG AGO! WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE?! I AM ZENJIN NOW! YOU DON'T EXIST ANYMOOORE!"

"Let him go!" Riko screamed as she jumped on Zenjin and tried to force him off of Kyoya, but the silver haired child virulently renounced her by shooting a ball of red light at her with one of his free hands, releasing his grip on Kyoya by one hand.

"Riko!" Marina managed to grab Riko with her arms and keep her from getting hurt. This gave Kyoya ample opportunity to punch Zenjin square in the cheek, forcing him to release his grip on the bespectacled redhead. This time, Hotaru managed to grab him before he could fall on the concrete pavement and hurt himself.

But Zenjin wasn't going to give up yet. As soon as he regained his balance he charged at Kyoya yet again, knocking Hotaru out of the way and pinning the helpless red haired boy down on the pavement. This time, Zenjin tried to punch Kyoya in the face, but the red haired boy managed to evade every single one of them simply by canting his head in different directions.

"Get off me, you psycho!" Kyoya yelled as he tried to squirm free, but Zenjin didn't look like he had any intention of letting him go.

"Get off him right now!" Anzu and Marina both tried to pry Zenjin off of him, but again, the fuming silver haired teenager knocked them all away with another beam of energy. What they didn't know was that Jiroemon is finally conscious and standing up...only to find that the first thing he's seeing is his son being pinned down by a crazed silver haired child.

The same rude child that attacked him earlier.

"HEY! LET GO OF MY SON!" Jiroemon yelled vehemently as he tackled Zenjin like a football player, knocking him off of the pavement, freeing Kyoya.

"Dad!" Kyoya shouted upon being freed, relieved that his father is okay. Now it's Jiroemon's turn to be mad as he gripped a surprised Zenjin's purple ruffle and lifted him by the shirt.

"Don't EVER lay another hand on my son, you punk! I oughta report you to the police!" Jiroemon roared passionately, his paternal instincts kicking in. He didn't seem to notice or care that Zenjin's face was wracked with fear, like he was face-to-face with someone he wanted nothing more than to get the heck away from at all costs, unable to move. Finally, he smacked Jiroemon in the face and teleported away.

"Come back here, you brat!" Jiroemon shouted. No response. Zenjin is long gone.

"Dad.." Kyoya muttered softly. Jiroemon turned around to find Kyoya sitting on the concrete without his wheelchair. His previous anger dissipated, getting replaced with tsunamis of relief and worry.

"Kyoya!" Jiroemon exclaimed tearfully as he ran over to his son and embraced him with his large, bulky arms, squeezing him as tightly as he could muster, like he never wanted to let go. "Thank God you're safe! I'd never forgive myself if something happened to you again because of me!" Jiroemon wailed as he hugged his red haired son.

"Dad...thanks...crushing...me…" Kyoya croaked, helplessly pushing on his dad's vest in a failed attempt to get out of his tight embrace. Finally, Jiroemon lessened his grip.

"I'm sorry...Kyoya...it's my fault you're paralyzed. I…I wish I could turn back time and change the tires so we wouldn't have had to stop in the middle of the road-" Jiroemon muttered with some tears streaming out from his eyes, trickling down into his beard. It broke Kyoya's heart to see his father so sad, but he smiled and put a hand on his tearful father's cheek.

"It's not your fault, Dad. You didn't know we'd get a flat tire. You didn't know that drunk driver was gonna hit me. How could you? It's not like you can see into the future or anything. I didn't know. You didn't know, and there was no way you could have been able to do anything. I don't blame you. Besides, I'm here now, aren't I?" Kyoya told him kindly, in a dulcet voice. Hearing this made Jiroemon's heart go warm. But then he suddenly felt woozy and collapsed onto his son. "Whoa! Dad!"

"Aaaand he's down," Marina piped in. Kyoya gently laid his unconscious father's head on the ground.

"He's tired and frazzled. I get that," Kyoya muttered as Riko went to grab his wheelchair and push it toward him.

"Need help getting in?" Riko asked as she brought it to him.

"No thanks. I can do it," Kyoya said when he put his hand on the wheelchair and slowly pulled himself back into it. "There! That should do it," He said as he sat back onto the seat.

Marina put a hand on Riko's arm. "Come on, Riko! We've gotta make a break for it!" She hissed, but Riko didn't budge. Instead, she just stood there with a sad look.

"Kyo-chan...I'm sorry. We can turn into superheroes. Are you...angry? If you are, then-" Riko muttered sadly, already fearing the worst until Kyoya cut her off...but not with the reaction she expected.

"Man, you were awesome out there, Riko! All of you!" Kyoya suddenly piped in, his emerald eyes gleaming with excitement and joy and his smile radiant like a fan getting their favorite celebrity's autograph. "You can really turn into superheroes?! That's sooooo cool! Thanks for saving me back there! I can't believe it! My friends are real life superheroes! This is the awesomest thing ever!"

Riko's initial fears finally went away. _'Kyo-chan...doesn't hate me? He doesn't think me being a superhero is bad? He...actually appreciates what I've done for him?'_ Riko thought, unable to comprehend Kyoya's unexpected reaction.

Kyoya was happy. He liked the fact that she's a superhero. He's grateful for what she had done, and appreciated the fact that she did try to save him from Zenjin despite the latter getting the upper hand. Riko could feel some more tears trickling out, but this time, they were tears of joy.

"Thank you...Kyo-chan…" Riko mused gratefully.

"Awww, man! He knows! Why'd you have to get us busted, huh?! You're supposed to keep our Pretty Cure identities a secret, remember?!" Marina yelped angrily. Riko didn't notice, as she was too happy right now.

"Hey! Quit it! I figured out it was her right away. She has the same eyes, voice, and body type. Don't make it sound like she did it on purpose!" Kyoya snapped, not happy with Marina yelling at Riko.

"By the way, how DID you get here anyway?" Hotaru asked.

"How did I get here, you ask? That bratty little pink plushie thingy dragged me all the way here against my will!" Kyoya exclaimed boldly, pointing to Lovebeam, who looked sad as her three angry younger sisters began scolding her.

"You should not have been so reckless, Lovebeam! If you really wanted to distract the monster, you could have done it in a way that wouldn't have caused any destruction, but because you acted so brashly, you exacerbated the damage done to the neighborhood!" Starbeam scolded gently.

"You ALWAYS do this! You almost got people killed, Lovebeam! People could have died because of you! We tried to stop you, but did you listen to a thing we said?! Noooo!" Sunbeam yelled vehemently, not nearly as merciful as Starbeam was being. "Why do you always have to make everything difficult?! You don't even apologize!"

"I wasn't! I was just trying to help! I can't believe you'd treat me this way after I've been alone, tired, hungry, and worrying myself to death for you!" Lovebeam whined petulantly, but this time, she actually seems genuinely sad that her sisters are yelling at her despite all they've been through.

"Quit with the little woe is me poor little you act!" Sunbeam yelled.

"I think that's enough, Sunbeam. She's been through a lot, just like we have," Moonbeam told her fiery sister gently, in her soft, sweet little voice. Finally, Sunbeam calmed down and decided enough is enough.

"Honestly, though, I'm glad you're all okay, and I'm sorry for worrying all of you," Lovebeam said.

"So...who is she again?" Marina asked, confused.

"I'll introduce you. This is our oldest sister, Lovebeam," Moonbeam introduced her kindly.

Lovebeam winked and pushed back one of her ears. "Ohh! A new audience? It's ever so nice to meet you! I'm their big sister, the oldest and prettiest in the family!"

Sunbeam rolled her eyes. "There she goes again."

They decided to sit under the shade of an untouched tree and explain everything to Kyoya and Lovebeam. Once they got the gist of everything, they became less frazzled. But once Lovebeam heard everything, her charmingly sweet, pudgy little face suddenly turned sour.

"My oh my! You four are the legendary Pretty Cures? I honestly don't see how you four can be them!" Lovebeam exclaimed. She suddenly pointed at Anzu. "You look evil with those black clothes!" She pointed to Marina. "You look like you'd destroy everything in the blink of an eye!" She pointed to Hotaru. "You look nerdy and don't look like a very capable leader!" Finally, she pointed to Riko. "You look like the weakest of them all! You don't look like you can do much of anything!"

"Lovebeam! That's not nice! Apologize right now!" Moonbeam scolded, appalled by Lovebeam's rude behavior. She felt it necessary to put her foot down despite being the youngest. "You should know better than to be so ungrateful and to judge people based on how they look! That's one of the laws of Rozaniela! Now apologize!"

"Jeez, and she's supposed to be the youngest sister," Marina mused irritably, her golden eyes squinting in an offended way in response to Lovebeam's caustic comments.

Sunbeam floated over to Riko and whispered in her ear, "Told ya she's a brat."

"Yeah. I know," Riko muttered in response.

"Sorry…" Lovebeam muttered reluctantly.

"Say it like you mean it, you spoiled brat!" Sunbeam yelled, not convinced or satisfied with Lovebeam's monotone sounding apology.

"There's something I've been meaning to bring up," Hotaru piped in. The kids and fairies all turned around to look at her and see what she had to say. "We have four fairies here, and there are five of us. Who's going to take on the responsibility of taking care of all of them?"

"Oh. I never...thought about that before. Moonbeam and Sunbeam have always stayed with me," Riko said.

"One person alone can't take care of four little fairies. Our parents might find out," Kyoya said.

"Hey! Here's an idea!" Anzu exclaimed cheerfully, standing as straight as a newly blooming sunflower. "How about we each take care of one fairy each day and rotate it every day so that we're not stuck with the same fairy every day!"

"That's a great idea! I like it!" Kyoya piped in.

"What do you little ones think?" Riko asked.

"I agree. It'll be a great way to get to know everyone better!" Moonbeam piped in sweetly.

"It certainly is," Starbeam said sweetly.

Lovebeam pouted. "I don't wanna."

"Sorry, but you lose to the majority, so deal with it!" Sunbeam sneered.

"Yeah, well, I don't want to anyway! I'm gonna stay with Kyoya-kun forever!" Lovebeam exclaimed as she flew over to Kyoya and sat on his lap.

"Hey! Don't decide stuff for me! You're just gonna mess up my room again!" Kyoya snapped.

"But you said you'd let me stay with you!" Lovebeam whimpered, using her sad, googly-eyed face.

"Only until you found your sisters!" Kyoya retorted back. Everyone burst into laughter upon seeing Lovebeam and Kyoya bicker like a husband and wife.

"Kyo-chan. Sorry you had to get wrapped up in this mess," Riko told him ruefully.

"I don't mind at all! I think it's cool you're all superheroes and stuff! I just wish I could help you guys out in some way," Kyoya replied cheerfully.

"I'll stay with Anzu for the time being, if that's okay," Moonbeam said.

"Sure. That's totally fine," Anzu said with a sweet smile.

"Can I hang out with you tonight, Riko?" Sunbeam asked.

"Sure!" Riko replied sweetly.

"So I guess I'm stuck with you then?" Marina asked Starbeam, who nodded.

"So that means I'm the only one without a fairy. That's fine. Whoever doesn't have a fairy can have a day off whenever possible," Hotaru piped in with a smile. Kyoya, the girls, and the fairies all burst into laughter, happy that they were sitting around, hanging out the way they were now. Riko couldn't help but wish this moment could go on forever. She never felt happier.


	8. Riko's First Ever Friend Get Together!

Chapter 8: Don't Ruin Our Day! Riko's First Ever Friend Get-Together!

A grumpy Zenjin sat on his tacky black bed, with one of the bloody red, roll cake-like cushions tucked underneath one of his arms, gazing listlessly at the transparent white canopy dangling around him like a ridiculously long bride's veil. His room was lit up with dimly lit candles that are hung all over his midnight blue walls, their little flames dancing on the wax. His long crimson red boots slumped in front of the foot of the bed, so his pale white feet were exposed, revealing that his black pants went down to slightly above his ankles.

His sparkling, sterling silver hair dangled on the grey pillows his head rested on, his golden diadem sitting a little ways above his head, having slipped off once he plopped himself on there just minutes before. He slowly extended his right arm, the one without the cushion underneath it, up into the air. He just stared listlessly at his hand, covered with a black fingerless glove, his fingers long, pencil thin, and oddly spindly, like it was the first time he ever saw a human hand.

All he wanted to do is go to sleep and not think about those annoying Pretty Cures that kept getting in the way of his fun. But he couldn't, because images of Kyoya kept flashing through his mind. The memory of attacking him like a ferocious wild animal ran through his mind again. His anger since then had disappeared, but the face of the innocent, red haired, bespectacled child didn't. His crimson eyes gleamed with a kind of odd wonder to them. He crossed his long, spindly legs in a pretzel shape despite still lying down on his black comforter.

"That red haired kid...he looks a lot like me," Zenjin mused to himself in a low, almost soft whisper, which even he himself found odd. He hadn't used a low indoor voice for a long time. "I can't believe he looks so much like my old self."

After another silent moment, he growled like a petulant child, sat back up on his bed, and threw his red cushion at a set of silver drawers, knocking a little pale green, rose decorated Victorian vase off of it, sending it crashing to the floor. _CRASH!_ It shattered into fragments of many sizes, lying on the floor, broken and unable to be fixed. The red cushion fell onto the floor and rolled back to the foot of the bed, stopped by Zenjin's long red boots.

"Aaaagh! Get a hold of yourself, Zenjin! You're not a wimpy little weakling anymore! You're Zenjin now, and you're way stronger now that you have all the power in the world to do whatever the heck you want!" Zenjin growled as he rubbed both of his hands in his silvery hair like he's trying to get bugs out of them, taking practically no notice of the damage he just did. He grunted right afterward. "So what if he looks like you? There's lots of people out there who look a bit alike!"

He thought he was alone. But he wasn't.

"My, this is quite an interesting bachelor pad you have here, Zenny boy," A deep, rich, male voice suddenly piped in out of nowhere, frightening the grumpy Zenjin into leaping off of his bed and taking on a battle stance.

"Who's there?!" Zenjin yelped angrily, ready for battle as he saw a black shadow waltz into his hallway, obscured by the darkness.

"Huh? You mean to tell me you don't recognize my voice, Zenny? I thought you'd be able to recognize it after five years," The voice said.

Once the dark silhouette came into the room, the darkness obscuring it dissipated, his true identity revealed by the dim candlelight. A man dressed in regal, red 18th century clothing, with long green hair cascading down to his lower back, and red eyes like rich wine.

Now that Zenjin got a good look at the green haired, elegantly dressed man in front of him, his previous anger dissipated like it had never been there in the first place, getting replaced with a look that was quite alien to him: pure, unadulterated joy. His crimson red eyes widened, gleaming with the kind of joy a little child would get when he'd get a new toy. As soon as his eyes fixated on the green haired man, he dropped his battle stance and proceeded to dash toward the green haired man.

"Decebal!" Zenjin cried out happily as he glomped the green haired man and wrapped his skinny little arms around him like an overly enthusiastic child. Decebal put his hands on Zenjin's red cape and stroke him gently.

"Sorry I couldn't come earlier, Zenny. It was hard trying to sneak out of Rozaniela unnoticed, and the citizens just would not stop asking me questions and forcing me to clean up the mess you made, which I really don't think needs any cleaning up," Decebal told him kindly, in a fatherly tone.

"I thought you'd never get here! You had me worried!" Zenjin exclaimed happily. "Oh! By the way, where's Beileag? Isn't she supposed to be here too?"

"She has some things she has to take care of. That, and she's having a bit of trouble finding this alternate dimension, even though I told her how to get here," Decebal replied as Zenjin finally released him and calmed down a bit. "By the way, did you really make all of this? This is a pretty fancy looking bachelor pad you have here."

"It's not a bachelor pad! This is my new fortress, AND our home!" Zenjin exclaimed with his arms outstretched and facing the ceiling. But a look of confusion overtook his pale face. "What is a bachelor pad anyway?" He asked in a soft, confused voice.

Decebal couldn't help but chuckle at Zenjin's lack of knowledge. "Oh, goodness! That evil woman really deprived you of even the most basic knowledge of your own world, didn't she?" Decebal laughed through his words. "A bachelor pad is slang for a house that only one man lives in all by himself, nobody else."

"Ohhhh. I see. But anyway, I'm seriously glad you're here, because there's something I really gotta tell you about!" Zenjin exclaimed, remembering the Pretty Cures.

"What's got you all in a tizzy? Other than the Energia making you more hormone addled than usual?"

"You'll never believe this! I found out I can look into people's Soul Portals and see every little thing about them! Their dreams, personalities, memories, insecurities, the most private of private thoughts they have, information about other people they know, etc. I can also rip out people's souls and turn them into black, animal-like monsters! It's so cool! I call them Human Trash!"

"My, that's quite a feat you've accomplished there! You'll have to show me how to do it sometime," Decebal replied, donning a mischievous smirk, his cherry red eyes gleaming with a more adult curiosity.

"But there's just one problem though," Zenjin said, his smile fading. "This annoying little band of girls who call themselves Pretty Cure keep getting in my way and ruining my fun!" Zenjin complained as he sat back on his bed like a petulant child forced to go into time out.

"Pretty Cure?" Decebal asked as he sat down on the bed next to him. "I've heard of those. The Queen said they're legendary warriors who once saved Earth and Rozaniela many decades ago. I didn't know there were more."

"Me neither. I didn't find out until last week. But they keep going on and on about how it's wrong to rip people's souls out and take advantage of the people I'm hurting yadda yadda yadda! Blech! I just wanna deck'em every time they spout all that stupid saccharine garbage!"

"That sounds quite troublesome. If you want, I'd be more than happy to help you out, Zenny."

The excited, childlike gleam and smile from before returned to Zenjin's eyes and face. "Really?! You will?! You're awesome, Decebal! I'm glad you're my pseudo-dad!" Zenjin exclaimed happily as he embraced his adoptive father again, just like before.

"You're gonna have to show me how to make these Human Trash. I don't know how!" Decebal replied happily through his chuckling.

"Don't worry! It's super easy!"

* * *

Riko couldn't wait for tomorrow-the day she would have her friends over for the very first time. It was a dream come true.

Finally, tomorrow did arrive. But not in the way Riko expected. While deep in sleep, Riko found herself being dragged out of dreamland by a sniveling sound. She woke up to find that her room was still a little dark, with little peeks of light blue rays coming through her window shades, brightening it up just a little bit. The sun hadn't peeked over the horizon yet. Still tucked underneath her thick blankets, Riko squirmed around to turn herself over so she could see what's making the sniveling noise.

That was all it took. Sunbeam was sleeping next to her. With tears streaming down her chubby orange cheeks. Her little hands were covering her eyes, which were squeezed shut.

Finding the sight to be unsettling, Riko found herself wide awake with worry and concern. But it didn't take very much to figure out exactly what was causing Sunbeam to cry softly in her sleep right away.

"Sunbeam?" She crooned quietly. Sunbeam uncovered her eyes, opened them, and turned to look at the concerned Riko. The tears just wouldn't stop. Her pudgy orange face was completely red from so much crying, and she even hiccupped a little. But she didn't seem to want to stop, not that Riko expected her to.

Riko pushed part of the blanket off of herself. "Do you want to snuggle with me?" Riko asked. Without hesitation, Sunbeam crawled over to Riko and nuzzled against her white, red rose decorated pajama shirt, still crying softly. As groggy and concerned Riko was for Sunbeam's heartbreak over what happened, she was at least happy Sunbeam wasn't crying loudly. She didn't want any members of her family waking up and finding a crying stuffed animal in her bed or kicking her out.

Riko then pulled out what appeared to be a small, old, slightly worn, white blanket with pink, blue, purple, and white markings on it edged with white velvet fabric. She very silently and gently draped it over the still sniveling Sunbeam. Once her pudgy little orange body was covered, Riko very gently stroke Sunbeam's ears and head with her hands, hoping caressing her would at least let her know that even though Riko doesn't know how to help her cope with the cruel revelation, she was at least there to lend her a shoulder she can cry on. Sunbeam seemed to get the message. Words aren't always needed to tell people what they need to hear. After a few minutes, Sunbeam finally stopped crying and fell back asleep. She snored soundly, but Riko kept her close, not wanting to let the little orange fairy wake back up in tears again.

'_I never thought I'd ever see the day where I'd comfort someone who's sad,'_ Riko thought as she continued to stroke the sleeping orange fairy. She remembered times when she'd have a bad day and come home crying like crazy, yearning for someone to hug her, stroke her, and tell her everything would be alright, even though it usually wouldn't be. Arinao, Saki, and Hikage always gave her mountains of hugs, kisses, and kind, well intentioned reassurances whenever possible.

Despite the feeling being quite alien to her, she could feel her heart fill to the brim with a kind of motherly warmth. Soon, her eyes closed all on their own, taking her back to her happy Riko dreamland.

For about another hour, anyway. At promptly 7:00 AM, Riko woke up and got herself ready for her long awaited Thursday. She decided to put on her perfectly planned outfit for today: beige pants, white and purple star themed socks, a cotton candy pink shirt with round, puffed sleeves and a matching ribbon sewn on the left part of the collar, and a gray unzipped sweater since it was chilly outside.

"That shirt looks cute on you," Sunbeam piped in, waking up to see Riko fully dressed and chipper.

"You think so? Thanks. I thought I'd look nice today since everyone's gonna come over today," Riko said as she packed her textbooks and notebooks into her book bag, along with a book, _Comet In Moominland_(1). After that, she ate breakfast, brushed her teeth, combed her hair, and went off to school. Even in homeroom, her excitement couldn't be contained, especially once she met up with Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina, who, admittedly, looked a little surprised by Riko's infectious cheer and joy.

"Jeez, Riko. Take a chill pill. I've never seen you this happy before," Marina asked, a little cowed by Riko's bubbly demeanor today.

"I've never ever had friends over my house before! That's why! I can't wait for you all to come! We're gonna play games, watch anime, read books, and talk, talk, talk!" Riko palavered happily.

"Me either. I'm gonna bring a bunch of my games so we can have Pokemon battles and that kind of stuff. I am so gonna beat you," Kyoya told her.

"Yay! Pokemon battles!" Riko squealed cutely as she whipped her arms around Kyoya and hugged him, causing his emerald eyes to widen with surprise. "This'll be super duper awesome! Man, I want school to end already!"

"Me too. We'll bring the fairies so they can hang out too. Is that okay?" Anzu asked with a sweet smile, charmed by Riko's vibrant and happy demeanor.

"Sure! Just be sure to keep them quiet around my parents and siblings. My little sister loves making a big deal out of everything I do so if she finds out they're real, she'll go on and on about it like no tomorrow and tell everybody who'll listen and make us miserable!" Riko explained.

"Kinda like how you're going on and on about this?" Marina asked sarcastically. Riko didn't pay her any heed.

"Ohh! I can't wait to have you guys over! It'll be so much fun! We're gonna play games, watch anime, read manga, eat food, and I'll be able to show you guys my house and my room and everything in it! This is a dream come true!" Riko's so wrapped up in her lovely little fantasy about having her friends over that she's completely closed off from everything and everyone else right now. Anzu and Kyoya didn't mind. Marina's still a little weirded out by how she keeps talking about it non-stop, but she's not as cowed as before. Riko had her hands clasped together and her emerald eyes are literally radiant with joy. Unfortunately, someone was intent on destroying that joy and knocking the gleam right out of her eyes.

"Will you shut your big fat mouth already?! No one wants to hear you ramble on and on about nothing!" The girl who assaulted Riko before, Yoshie, shouted from across the room, finally stopping Riko from going on further. But Yoshie wound up getting mean looks from Kyoya, Anzu, Marina, and the teacher in response.

"Mind your own business, you snob!" Anzu shot back.

"I'd like to if you tell your friend to shut her mouth! Her screechy voice is making my ears bleed!" Yoshie snapped back.

"Your voice is way screechier!" Marina piped in venomously.

"Enough. Inoue, that was uncalled for. You're getting detention with me today!" Mrs. Omori suddenly exclaimed as she stepped in front of Yoshie's desk sternly.

"Why me? I'm just trying to do my work but that idiot won't shut up! Nobody's interested in her stupid get together! It's ruining my concentration!" Yoshie whined petulantly.

"I'm not playing games here. You're coming to detention with me right when school ends, and I don't want to hear any excuses either!" Mrs. Omori scolded again. Yoshie pouted and slumped in her seat, but not before shooting Riko a dirty look that said, _'It's your fault this is happening! I'm gonna deck you for this!'_ Riko found herself slumping in her own seat, her previous joy dissipating.

Despite this, she resolved to get through the day, since she had been looking forward to it for quite a while. As they say, good things come to those who wait. For the most part, the day went by rather fine. Nobody acted out in class, the lessons were still easy as pie to do, she listened intently and took notes when needed, and made sure to avoid any drama.

But all throughout, she kept on dreaming fancy little dreams about her friends coming over. She'd be the host of the get-together, offering them food or drinks when they asked, asking which anime they want to watch or books they want to read or if they want to play games like hide and seek or tag. Sure, preteen girls don't play these things, but who says all preteen girls don't play them? There had to be some who do. Anzu and Marina don't like dressing in flashy, promiscuous clothes, putting on makeup and nail polish, go get their hair done at those fancy expensive salons, beautify themselves, talk endlessly about boys and going on eternal dates with them, or that mushy stuff. They certainly didn't look like they'd do all that. Riko knew she wasn't one of those girls, like Yoshie. No, they'd do their own thing, and nobody would stop them. She'd especially try to make sure Rina won't ruin it with her mouthiness and tendency to point out Riko's flaws and eccentricities to anyone who'd listen at the top of her lungs.

When the final bell rang, she reminded her friends of the meeting time and skipped into Saki's car, happy to finally be done with school for the day. When Riko got home, she cleaned her room up a little bit. She noticed Sunbeam sitting quietly on her bed, reading one of Riko's Moomin books. Sunbeam didn't mind Riko putting some stuffed animals around her. They were soft and fuzzy, and Sunbeam didn't mind soft and fuzzy one bit.

Riko and Sunbeam then kept themselves occupied for the next hour so Riko wouldn't drive herself crazy waiting for them to come. When the long hand was about two minutes away from covering the twelve sign on Riko's little Doraemon clock, she rushed into the living room, hopped on the big couch and looked out her big window.

"Where are they?" Riko mused to herself as she stared out the window. Saki sat on one of the chairs in the living room, reading more of her Kindle.

"They'll be here. Don't worry," Saki told her reassuringly, but Riko paid her no heed. Rina waltzed into the room.

"Told you she was faking it!" Rina piped in.

"Rina! Zip it!" Hikage snapped from within the dining room as he worked on some rather tedious calculus homework. He hated calculus with the fiery passion of a thousand suns.

It didn't take long for Rina to be proven wrong in every way possible, as Riko caught sight of a large blonde ponytail swaying in the wind, riding on what appeared to be a big green bike. "Yeek! An-chan's here!" Riko squeed happily as she leaped off of the couch, threw her shoes on without putting on any socks, and ran out the door. "An-chaaaan!"

"Hey, Riko!" Anzu said as she got off her bike and found herself getting glomped by an overly happy Riko, who laughed and squeezed her like she didn't want to let go. Soon, Riko released Anzu from her grasp and let her set her bike on the front yard. "Welcome to the esteemed Tasogare household! Come on in! Come on come on come on!" When Anzu finished, Riko edicted a rather grandiose sounding welcome, took her by the hand, and dragged her into the house. Anzu managed to grab her book bag before she got dragged inside.

"An-chan, that's my mom, Saki, my dad, Arinao, my big brother, Hikage, and my little sister, Rina! Mom, Dad, Hikage, and Rina, this is my first ever female friend, Chino Anzu!" Riko introduced Anzu to her family in a rather loud voice, not realizing her voice has gone up an octave or two. But Anzu didn't mind. She just waved her little hand shyly.

"Hi," Anzu mused with a smile. Both parents shook Anzu's hands.

"We're very happy to meet you," Arinao said with a smile.

"Riko's told us a whole lot about you. Would you like anything to eat or drink?" Saki told her kindly.

"I'm good for right now. Thanks," Anzu said.

Nobody noticed Rina staring at Anzu with a rather surprised yet not very impressed and even scornful look on her round little face. Rina let every single detail of Anzu sink into her brain: her thick glasses, her large, golden yellow ponytail, her black pants and boots, her black and red hoodie, her pale blue short sleeved shirt underneath, her black and green book bag, and her pale skin.

'_She's weird. Is she one of those goths or something? Those are creepy!'_ Rina pondered with her arms crossed. But she didn't dare ask out loud, as Riko would really wail on her if she opened her mouth. But she did cross the creepy part off since Riko and Anzu were chatting and getting along happily.

"Do you wanna watch any anime with me? I have some really good ones!" Riko asked, her

eyes gleaming with joy.

Anzu happened to glance out the living room window and noticed a midnight blue van pulling up on the street. "I think Kyoya's here."

"Kyo-chan?!" Riko yelped as she leaped back off the couch. "Be right back!" Riko shouted happily as she dashed out the front door again.

"Riko! Wait!" Saki chased after her, surprised at how quickly she managed to dash out of there like she was some cheetah, even more so by her sudden newfound exuberance and bubbliness.

Hikage chuckled as he turned toward Anzu. "She tends to get a little too excited over stuff she likes sometimes," Hikage told her with a smile.

"I'm exactly like that," Anzu replied as she pulled out a silver Nintendo DS with a little Edward Elric strap dangling from it.

Rina's eyes widened with surprise. _'There's more?! There can't be more! Riko's faking it! She has to be!'_ She screamed in her head. The concept of Riko having actual, real, genuine, non-imaginary friends was as much an alien concept as there being such thing as aliens and ghosts.

Saki did manage to catch up to Riko, but her eyes widened at what was coming out of the midnight blue van. A flat, shiny, silver metal ramp protruded from the van, hitting the ground, and a red haired, bespectacled boy in a wheelchair wheeled onto the sidewalk through it. He's wearing an unbuttoned, green, black, and white, long sleeved plaid shirt over a short sleeved black one, light blue jeans, and black and white sneakers.

"Kyo-chan!" Riko cheered as she ran over to Kyoya and trapped him in a hug similar to what Anzu endured just minutes before.

"Hey Riko! Sorry I couldn't get here sooner," Kyoya said as he returned the warm, loving hug by wrapping his own arms around her. Soon, the kids released each other from their embrace, oblivious to the fact that Saki had bewilderment written all over her face. Soon, a woman with short, scraggly crimson hair in a darker shade and soft, gentle looking chocolate brown eyes came onto the sidewalk looking quite happy.

"Hi there! You must be Riko-chan, right? I'm Kayoko, Kyoya's mother. My boy's told me so much about you," The short haired woman, Kayoko, asked, with a face beaming with joy and curiosity, happy to finally meet one of her son's new friends. But Riko suddenly hid behind Saki. Kayoko's smile faded and she donned a confused face. So did Kyoya.

"Sorry. She's shy. I'm her mother, Tasogare Saki," Saki said as she gently pried Riko off of her shirt and shook Kayoko's hand.

"It's so nice to meet you and your daughter. Kyo-chan's been going on and on about this get-together for the past week. Oh! This is my husband, Mitomo Jiroemon," Kayoko smiled as she talked to Saki, then noticed her husband next to her with a wooden ramp folded and tucked underneath his big arms. He stopped when Kayoko introduced him. It was here that Arinao suddenly appeared next to Saki.

"Hi. It's nice to meet you. Do you mind if I set this up on your porch?" Jiroemon asked, his face a little red from seeing Saki and Arinao eye his ramp.

Arinao flashed a smile. "Go right ahead," Arinao told him, giving Jiroemon permission to set up the ramp. Kayoko, Saki, and Arinao began chatting among themselves, leaving Riko and Kyoya to go back inside the house once Jiroemon set the ramp up on the Tasogare family's porch.

Anzu peered her eyes away from the floor as she noticed Riko trying to push Kyoya's wheelchair into the house, which she managed to do without any problems. "Hey, you made it!" Anzu exclaimed cheerfully, her lime green eyes radiant with joy.

"Hey! Wanna see the rest of my house?" Riko asked happily as Kyoya got inside.

"Sure! Give us the grand tour, Ri-chan!" Kyoya piped in.

"Okay! This is the living room, over there is the kitchen, over there is the dining room, and way back in there is the den. We have a big flat screen TV in there!" Riko explained as she showed them everything on the floor of the house they're on.

* * *

While Riko was giving them the grand tour of the house, Riko's parents and Kyoya's parents found themselves completely locked in conversation with one another. But they were quite happy to finally get to know one another thanks to their kids, so they didn't mind one bit. What they didn't know was that they were too wrapped up in chatting away to notice an orange haired girl looking up at them with a bit of a shy, nervous look on her face.

"Um, excuse me…" She muttered shyly, but they didn't notice. Thankfully, she didn't have to resort to yelling or anything like that, because Jiroemon finally turned his head the other way and wound up noticing her.

"Hello. When did you get here?" Jiroemon asked, a little frazzled by the sight of the wavy haired girl standing before him.

"Oh. Hello, Asagi-san. You're here. The door's open so you can go right in," Arinao told her kindly, pointing to the house.

"Wait wait wait, Asagi?! So you're the wretched girl who constantly bullied my son for the past year and a half!" Kayoko's smiling face disappeared like it was never there as soon as she heard the name Asagi. She looked like she wanted to wail on the fearful looking orange haired girl until Jiroemon stood in front of her.

"I think it's time we get going. Let's let the children have fun," Jiroemon explained as he tried to calm Kayoko down and get her inside the car. Kayoko, not wanting to make a scene in front of their new friends, repressed her rage and slumped into the van. Marina didn't go inside, even after they drove away. She looked down at the sidewalk with a sad look.

"Maybe coming here was a bad idea," Marina muttered, thinking her voice was low enough to the point where nobody could hear.

"No. It isn't. Come on inside. The kids are waiting," Arinao gently escorted her inside, much to the surprise of both Marina and Saki.

"But...she's right, y'know. I picked on her kid, too. I kinda deserved it," Marina said. She was surprised Arinao wasn't making a big deal about what she had done.

"Everyone deserves a second chance, and you've done more than enough to receive one. Now come on in," Arinao told her gently as he escorted her and Saki inside.

Once Marina was inside, Riko introduced her trio of friends to Hikage and Rina. Hikage was clearly happy to meet them. Before he could introduce himself, all of a sudden, a furry little Australian Shepherd scurried into the room and began barking.

"Arf! Arf!" She yelped, causing Riko to cover her ears.

"Bad, Yumiko! No barking at friends!" Riko scolded as she tried to kneel down and get a grip on Yumiko's collar so she could properly scold her. The yappy little dog just wouldn't relent until Hikage managed to kneel down and put his hand around her muzzle.

"No. No barking at friends. Bad," Hikage told the little dog firmly and lucidly, even though Yumiko did not like having a hand on her muzzle one bit.

"Sorry. This is Yumiko, my puppy. She barks at strangers, but she's really nice and sweet!" Riko told her.

"Awww! She's so cute! I wish I had a puppy to snuggle!" Anzu crooned sweetly, awestruck by the cute little pup despite it barking at her earlier.

"What kind of dog is she?" Marina asked curiously, her cheeks developing a sweet, cotton candy pink shade upon seeing the little dog.

"She's a miniature Australian Shepherd," Riko explained.

"Never heard of that one. But she sure is pretty," Marina said. "But if I ever got a dog, it'd be a St. Bernard. They're big and cool and they rescue people!"

"One of my next door neighbors has a St. Bernard puppy. If you ever come over my house sometime, I'd love to introduce you. I've walked him a couple times and he's really friendly!" Kyoya explained.

"I'd love to!" Riko chirped.

Once he finished scolding Yumiko, who went off to play with one of her puppy toys, he shook all of their hands and even set up the Wii for them to play with. He had lots of Wii motes, and he usually used them for when his own friends used to come over. Rina didn't want to play. She just watched everybody with a curious stare. Not only was Riko actually not faking having friends, she actually has three real friends!

They played Super Smash Brothers Brawl. Riko kept losing whenever she tried to play since she's not very good at playing a Wii or operating the Wii mote, but Anzu, Kyoya, Marina, and Hikage played and laughed and bellowed at their losses and wins like they've done it for years. Riko felt a warm feeling creep into her heart as she played with her trio of friends.

Is this what it's like to have friends? To have fun among other people? To be normal? She couldn't help but wonder even as her Lucas avatar got knocked into oblivion once again by Kyoya's Sonic The Hedgehog avatar. She wished the Moomins were in Brawl, as she'd play as them all the time.

What Riko didn't know was that Marina was wondering the exact same thing, as she herself never got to do these things with other people, even more so with the fact that she was an only child. Marina never thought she would ever experience this joy. It was so alien to her, she thought it was a dream at first. But she wasn't dreaming. She was living in reality, and wow, reality was a lot nicer than she thought it'd be! Was God finally fulfilling her wishes and granting her greatest desires at last? She wasn't sure, but she knew one thing for sure: she doesn't want this fun to end!

When Hikage put away the Wii game, Riko turned to her trio of friends and asked, "You guys want anything to drink?"

"I'm good," Kyoya piped in.

"Same here," Anzu piped in.

"Do you have any orange juice by any chance?" Marina asked lucidly, feeling much more relaxed and comfortable than she was earlier.

"Sure! One glass of orange juice coming right up! Whee!" Riko squealed cheerfully and skipped into the kitchen, but stopped when she felt Saki's hand pat her left shoulder.

"Riko. Can I ask you something?" Saki asked.

"What? Did I do something wrong?" Riko asked back as she opened the fridge and pulled the orange juice carton out. Did Saki suddenly change her mind about having friends over now that she's seen them?

"No, not at all. It's just…" Saki sounded hesitant as Riko opened the orange juice carton as slowly as she could so she wouldn't spill anything, but she continued on. "You never told me one of your friends is in a wheelchair. How come you didn't say anything about it?"

'_I knew she was gonna ask about that,'_ Riko thought as she very slowly poured orange juice into a glass cup she got out of the cupboard. "I wanted it to be a surprise. Plus I was afraid that if I told you, you'd decide to change your mind about me being his friend and not like him anymore, or even tell me not to be his friend."

Saki repressed the urge to gasp. Riko actually thought her own mother would change her mind about having a friend over just because he happens to be in a wheelchair? And not only that, she thought she wouldn't approve of her being friends with someone in a wheelchair at all? Saki couldn't believe Riko doubted her that much or even so much as thought of a scenario like that.

Once her surprise disappeared, her smile returned and she put her hands on both of Riko's shoulders. "Don't ever think you're not allowed to be friends with people with disabilities. I don't mind at all. Your friends are wonderful kids, and it makes me happy to see you all getting along. I don't care if they have issues. You're allowed to be friends with whoever you like. I'm just happy you've made some friends at all."

"I did tell him our house isn't wheelchair accessible, but he says he doesn't care," Riko replied.

"I see. I'm also happy you treat him the same as the rest of your friends and don't leave him out. I'm so proud of you, Riko," Saki told her and gave her a quick hug.

"Thanks. Gotta give Mari-chan her orange juice. We can't deprive her of any Vitamin C, now can we?" Riko said as she took the glass and gently walked back to the living room. Saki giggled at what Riko said just now.

Riko slowly handed Marina the orange juice class. "Thanks," Marina said before sipping some.

"You're welcome! I also have some snacks laying around, like cookies and fruit gummies and-"

"Hey! How come you're in a wheelchair?" Rina asked Kyoya loud enough for the whole house to hear. Everyone stopped what they were doing and turned to look at the pint sized girl sizing Kyoya.

Riko could feel her cheeks burn. "Rina! You can't ask questions like that! It's rude!" Riko piped in.

"I just wanna know!" Rina snapped back.

Kyoya's green eyes developed a kind of mischievous gleam as he crossed his arms, donned a smirk, and leaned toward Rina to make full eye contact with her. "So you're Riko's little sister, huh? I've heard a lot about you. She's right, y'know. It's not polite to ask people personal questions like that, but to answer your question, I was in a car accident, and my legs are weak because of it. I have to use this in order to get around. I'm a lot better now than I used to be, though," Kyoya told her in a firm voice, but it had a sarcastic tone to it, like he was trying to make Rina eat her words.

Rina didn't notice. "That's so weird." Riko facepalmed.

"You think being in a wheelchair is weird? I actually think it's kinda cool. You should try it sometime, then you'll know what it's like. Plus, there's way weirder stuff out there. Did you know there are people out there who actually marry video game characters?" Kyoya retorted without losing a beat.

Anzu covered her mouth and squeezed her eyes shut, repressing the urge to burst into a paroxysm of laughter. Marina, Riko, and Rina were nothing short of flabbergasted.

'_Jeez, I knew Kyoya could be sarcastic, but he doesn't even spare seven-year-old girls! He doesn't mess around. I'm sorry I ever picked on him,'_ Marina thought.

'_People can marry video games?! That can't be true! I may love my favorite cartoons to death, but I've stopped wanting to marry Snufkin two years ago!'_ Riko thought, completely missing the point.

Rina was so flabbergasted she couldn't even think or say any words. Even if she wanted to, she couldn't, as Saki took her by the hand and led her out of the living room, looking very stern.

"Wow, Kyo-kun. You sure showed her who's boss," Anzu said, having successfully squelched the urge to laugh out loud.

Kyoya flashed a mischievous smile at her. "I don't mess around," Kyoya piped in, feeling proud of managing to make a fool out of the little seven-year-old.

"How do you do it? She never stops talking even when I yell at her," Riko asked curiously.

"I've dealt with a couple brats lately, so I just say it like it is and don't sugarcoat anything. It's better to tell it like it is than beat around the bush, because if you do, they'll think you don't really mean what you say, and sometimes being honest is the best way to beat somebody at their own game," Kyoya explained.

"I wish I could be like that, but everybody tells me it's inappropriate to say some stuff," Riko mused as she looked down and shuffled her feet against the rug.

"That's different, Riko," Hikage interjected.

"Hey! You wanna see my room?" Riko asked.

"Yeah! Sure!" Anzu exclaimed cheerfully, being the first to leap off the couch. Riko escorted her and Marina up the stairs and into her room. But when she got back down, she soon figured out why Kyoya was so adamant about coming over even when she told him her house isn't wheelchair accessible.

He wheeled in front of the stairs and slowly pulled himself out of his chair. He got on all fours at the bottom of the stairs and proceeded to try and climb the stairs on his hands and knees. His hand gripped the fourth stair as Riko walked behind him.

"You're not gonna crawl up the stairs, are you?" Riko asked with worry peppering her sweet, concerned voice.

"Yeah," Kyoya replied rather casually. Actually, a little too casually, like Riko's question was the most normal thing in the world.

"It might be dangerous. I don't want you to slip and fall. Can you legs even work enough to help you crawl?" Riko asked worriedly.

"Yeah. I've practiced. Don't worry, Ri-chan. I'll be fine. I've done this lots of times before. Besides, I was serious when I said I'm not as paralyzed as I used to be," Kyoya told her as he managed to pull himself up some more stairs. "The good thing is I've actually gotten some pretty good exercise from doing this a lot!"

'_Wow. Kyo-chan IS serious, but I didn't think he'd be _this_ serious,'_ Riko thought, more flabbergasted at the sight of Kyoya actually managing to climb up some of the stairs without any problems. "Okay. But I'll be down here so in case you fall, you don't get hurt," Riko said as she watched Kyoya vigorously climb the stairs on all fours. After a few grueling minutes, he managed to make it all the way to the top! Not only that, he crawled right into Riko's room, where he and Riko were greeted by all four fairy sisters.

"Hey! Riko-chan! Kyoya-kun! We were wondering when you'd get here," Sunbeam exclaimed cheerfully.

"How'd you all get here? And when?" Riko asked.

"An-chan told me about the get-together, so I thought I'd go and tell the other fairies about it so they could come too. Is that okay?" Moonbeam explained kindly.

"My goodness!" Lovebeam exclaimed petulantly. "Your wardrobe is absolutely bland! There's nothing with any frills or lace or sequins or anything even remotely fit for a girl! It's all T-shirts, jeans, and plain ol' shirts!" Lovebeam tried to rummage through Riko's closet but Starbeam managed to grab one of her ears and keep her from doing any damage.

"You mustn't be so rude, Lovebeam!" Starbeam scolded.

"Umm...how'd you get up here?" Anzu asked, noticing Kyoya without his wheelchair.

"I crawled," Kyoya replied casually as he crawled next to them and arranged his legs in a pretzel shape so he can be at their level.

"It's true. I saw him do it," Riko said.

"But if you can crawl, how come you can't walk?" Sunbeam asked.

"It's just the walking part I need to work on some more. That's all," Kyoya explained. "Oh! Here's an idea! Let's play Would You Rather!"

"Ohh!" Riko's eyes gleamed cheerfully. "I love that game!"

"What's that?" Starbeam asked curiously.

"It's a game we got from a TV show. I give you two really insane choices, and you have to pick which one you have to do!" Kyoya explained.

"Me first!" Marina exclaimed enthusiastically, raising one of her hands. "Okay...Riko! Would you rather...eat ten live spiders, or...wear the color green for the rest of your life?"

"Ew! I'll wear green forever! I HATE spiders! They're all evil! Plus Snufkin wears green all the time!" Riko exclaimed, flailing her arms around. The kids and fairies all laughed heartily and merrily. Once Riko calmed down, she got back in the game. "My turn. Lovebeam! Would you rather...shave your entire body completely bald or...drink five whole bottles of ketchup?"

"Ugh! I hate this game! Can't I do neither?" Lovebeam complained.

"Nope! You have to pick one! It's the rule!" Riko told her.

"Noooo!" Lovebeam whined like a brat. "I don't wanna shave my beautiful, luscious, cotton candy pink fur, and I hate ketchup!"

"It's just a game. It's not like you have to do it in real life," Anzu piped in.

"Alright. Let's skip it. Asagi!" Kyoya exclaimed, deciding to divert the game to her. "Would you rather...eat five pounds of raw liver or...walk around in a wedding dress for an entire day?"

"Liver. Full stop. Dresses and I don't mix," Marina answered in the most deadpan way possible.

"Me too! I hate dresses!" Riko exclaimed happily.

"Me three, unless they're long, black, vampire-themed dresses I can wear for Halloween! I don't mind cosplaying in a dress, though," Anzu piped in.

"Liver's gross," Moonbeam piped in.

The kids and fairies had a jolly time playing their games and going on about whatever they wanted to talk about. Riko's bedroom became a lot more merry, and a warm kind of invisible glow filled it, making it more cheerful and alive. Again, Riko couldn't believe any of this was happening. She actually has friends over. Real friends. Real people. They're hanging out in her room. Talking, laughing, playing, doing all the things normal kids do whenever they go over other people's houses. She couldn't fabricate this if she tried. Soon, the kids and fairies decided to stop playing Would You Rather.

"Hey! I have an idea!" Riko chirped. "We should come up with a name for our Pretty Cure team! I mean, we are superheroes after all, and we can't be a proper team without a cool name!"

"Good point. Plus with all the Pretty Cure shows out there, we'll need to differentiate ourselves from them," Marina said.

"Since a lot of our names are associated with light, how about something like...Light Pretty Cure?" Kyoya suggested.

"Nah, too simple. It needs to be cool! Dazzling! Marvelous!" Riko exclaimed.

"How about Dazzle Pretty Cure?" Anzu piped in.

"Frazzle Pretty Cure?" Sunbeam piped in, which made everyone burst out laughing.

"Nice one," Marina croaked through her laughter.

"Maybe Brilliant Pretty Cure?" Kyoya suggested again.

"Emissaries of Light, Pretty Cure?" Anzu asked.

"Shining Pretty Cure?" Riko piped in.

"Glow Pretty Cure?" Starbeam suggested.

"Lovebeam Pretty Cure?" Lovebeam suggested cutely, with a wink.

"Absolutely not!" Everyone said in perfect unison right to Lovebeam's face. Lovebeam, disappointed with their blunt rejection, crossed her little pink arms and slumped onto Kyoya's lap.

"Why don't we just call it LuminousQ Pretty Cure? Y'know, Q as in Quartet, luminous as in shining, radiant, and glowing...like that," Moonbeam suggested.

Everyone looked at each other, then turned back to the purple fairy. "I like it!" Anzu piped in with a smile.

"The Q adds to the cuteness factor, and the luminous part really makes us come off as dazzling and awesome when we transform! We can banish the darkness with our lights of hope! And since there are four Pretty Cures, the quartet part is perfect, even more so in that if we get a new member, we can call ourselves a quintet and not have to change it! Oh! I already came up with our super cool brand new catch phrase!" Riko exclaimed happily, taking a big liking to their name. She soon stood up and did some overly dramatic superhero poses.

"Whenever there is darkness, we will banish it with the lights shining in our hearts. We are the radiant, the dazzling, the illustrious, the illumination! The luminous quartet! LuminousQ Pretty Cure!" Riko proclaimed in a somewhat hammy superhero voice.

"You sound like a real superhero, Ri-chan," Kyoya said with a laugh as Riko sat down.

"Isn't it a little long?" Starbeam asked.

"But I couldn't come up with anything more inspiring or dazzling. Aren't the Pretty Cures supposed to inspire hope in the citizens, fighting for love and friendship and justice?" Riko asked. Nobody said anything. "So...who wants to watch an anime? I've got lots of them."

She pulled out a big box of DVDs from under her bed. The kids and fairies looked through them to see what she has. She has Moomins, Maple Town, Pokemon, Little Princess Sara, Dog of Flanders, Fancy Lala, Anne of Green Gables and its prequel series, various Digimon seasons, Les Miserables Shoujo Cosette, Heartcatch Pretty Cure, Suite Pretty Cure, Jewelpet Twinkle, Natsume Yuujinchou, Ringing Bell, Sea Prince and the Fire Child, Unico, Card Captor Sakura, Ouran High School Host Club, Tamayura, and Angelic Layer.

'_These are all either kids stuff or stuff I never knew existed before...'_ Marina thought as she rummaged through some DVDs.

"Oh! Oh! Can we watch Ouran? I kept missing the seventh episode! The one called Jungle Pool SOS," Anzu suggested, her face turning pink with cheer.

"Sure! Ouran it is!" Riko exclaimed as she pulled out her DVD box set of the series. _'I kinda figured they'd pick it,'_ Riko thought. What she didn't know was that Kyoya was eyeing both her Moomin DVDs and a big white plushie on her bed with a big brown stain on its nose.

They went down to the living room (and Kyoya back in his wheelchair), popped in the DVD and watched the episode they decided on. Lots of laughs were heard from the living room. They were oblivious to the fact that Rina slipped into the living room to watch with them. She made herself scarce so she wouldn't attract any unwanted attention. That didn't stop Anzu from glancing at her, but she decided not to say anything. As soon as the episode ended, the phone rang in the dining room.

"I'll get it!" Saki announced as she scurried to the phone and answered it. "Hello? Oh! Hi! What's that? You need to talk to them right away? Okay." Saki then walked into the living room. "Riko? Hotaru's on the phone. She wants to talk to you."

The kids looked at each other with confused faces, full of wonder as to why Hotaru would call them. Riko took the phone from Saki. "Hi Hotaru-chan!" She said cheerfully.

"_Riko. I'm sorry to bother you like this, but I need you and the others to come to the park on Benkei street right away. There's a Corrupt Sentinel attacking and I'm having some trouble with it,"_ Hotaru told them over the phone.

"What? Seriously?" Riko yelped.

"_Yes. It hasn't gotten into town yet, but I may need backup in case it decides to go wild, just in case. But Zenjin isn't here. A green haired man made it this time,"_ Hotaru stammered.

"Really? Okay. I get it. Thanks," Riko said as she ended the call and gave the phone back to Saki.

* * *

Cure Starlight, with her naginata in both hands, stood in a defensive stance as a ginormous black guinea pig the size of a small, children's sized school bus tried to yank it out of her hands with its teeth. After a short while of trying to break free, she headbutted it with such force that it wound up forcing her to back away. The guinea pig squealed in an annoyingly high pitched voice as it got headbutted and wound up rolling into some trees, knocking them down deeper into the forest. The only things that it destroyed before this were a set of swings. After this, Cure Starlight put away her naginata, charged at the guinea pig and pummeled it with swift punches and kicks, knocking it deeper into the forest.

"You're quite strong, mademoiselle. I can certainly see why Zenjin is having such a hard time dealing with you. But I really do suggest you just leave this poor creature alone and go back to playing with your little dollies or cooking for your husband," A green haired man dressed in extremely Shakespearian styled raiment mocked as he stood on a tree branch like he was walking on water. Starlight paid absolutely no attention to him as she landed yet another punch on the squealing guinea pig's nose.

This made the green haired man quite perturbed. "Hey! If someone's talking to you, it's your job to listen and obey their commands, you cocky little wench!" The green haired man wailed vehemently.

"I'd rather eat raw liver and swim in a pool of boiling lava than listen to you ramble!" Cure Starlight sneered as she pulled her naginata back out and slashed the guinea pig in the chest with it, making it squeal even further.

All of a sudden, a blow to her face sent her flying. She found herself thrown out of the forest and into the street. Some people slowly crowded around her, watching the fiasco, wondering what was going on. Some bystanders had their cell phones out, recording everything. Cure Starlight managed to get back on her feet, but the green haired man floated in front of her and drew out what appears to be a medieval rapier, pointing it right to her chin.

"Now be a good little girl and go back to your kitchen. Girls really shouldn't be undertaking a man's arduous work," The green haired man told her condescendingly. Hotaru got her naginata back out, leaped away from the man, and tried to slash him, but he blocked her naginata with his rapier.

"You dress like you're from the era of Queen Elizabeth, but you talk like you're from the 1950s! Have you been living under a rock?!" Cure Starlight hissed as she actually managed to knock the rapier out of the green haired man's hands. The rapier almost hit a little girl, but she managed to run away before it fell onto the concrete.

"Hmph! You may be tough, but in the end, you're still a delicate little lady who doesn't know her place!" The green haired man exclaimed as he scurried to where his rapier fell and pulled it back out, ready to slash the blue girl to pieces.

"Stop right there, you sexist knave!" The commanding voice of Cure Dawn exclaimed from atop a roof of a house. Cure Starlight looked up, elated to see Cures Twilight, Dawn, and Dusk within her vicinity. The trio of girls leaped in front of the weary, exhausted Cure Starlight, ready for battle.

"You should know better than to claim girls should only stick to playing with dolls and getting married! What time period did you come from? The fifties?" Cure Dusk proclaimed boldly, without a care in the world. The green haired man couldn't resist glaring at them with his scorn filled eyes.

"Just who are you anyway?" Cure Twilight asked.

"If you must know, I go by the name Decebal. My charge Zenjin has told me you've been quite an annoyance to him. I figure I might as well take some time out of my busy schedule and teach you to know your place!" Decebal introduced himself like a chivalrous gentleman at first, but with fire in his eyes he grabbed his rapier and charged at the girls. But before he could lay a scratch on them, a glowing dome knocked him and his rapier away, provided by the fairy quartet.

"Starlight and Twilight! You handle the giant guinea pig! Dawn, Dusk, and the rest of us will distract this green haired guy! Hurry!" Lovebeam commanded. Without any hesitation, Cures Starlight and Twilight leaped away from the scene and headed for the black guinea pig, who suddenly decided to run on the street and into the neighborhood.

"Oh, no you don't! Twilight Serenade!" Cure Twilight howled as she shot a beam of light at the guinea pig, knocking it off its feet and sending it rolling on the street like a log that got loose. Not wanting to let it get back up and destroy everything, Cures Starlight and Twilight bombarded it with a flurry of punches and kicks, causing it to squeal. The noise caused Cure Twilight to suddenly stop in the middle of the street and cover her ears in fright.

"Ugh! Too loud!" Cure Twilight cried, squeezing her hands over her ears.

"Starlight Shower!" Cure Starlight raised her hand in the air, then flung it downward as a shower of glowing bluish white stars rained down on the hapless guinea pig.

The black guinea pig was rendered unconscious and motionless. Starlight then noticed a teenaged boy about her age coming closer to the fallen guinea pig holding a smartphone in his hands, looking like he wanted to record it. Cure Twilight was the first to get in front of the boy.

"You need to take a few steps back. It's too dangerous. If this thing wakes up again, it'll kill you. We'll handle things here," Cure Twilight told him firmly. Despite his face contorting with frustration because of being told off, the boy walked away.

Starlight and Twilight nodded to each other as they heard Dusk attempt to make Decebal go up in flames.

"Starlight Shower!"

"Twilight Sparkle!"

With their powers combined, the black guinea pig dissipated, leaving a glass ball behind. Cure Starlight ran to it and picked it up. "Thank you, Twilight. That green haired man corrupted my next door neighbor. I'll give this back to her. You help Dawn, Dusk, and the fairies," Cure Starlight said as she scooped the glass ball into her arms and scurried off to find her neighbor.

Cures Dawn and Dusk attempted to land a double kick on the green haired man, but with a swish of his hand, an ominous wind of purple gust sent them flying to the street. The fairies shot multicolored balls of light at him, managing to send him stumbling, but he shot another blast of violet wind at them. Unlike with Dawn and Dusk, the fairies managed to both evade the attack and throw themselves at him, knocking him further up the street.

"Dusk Medley!" Cure Dusk fired flaming musical notes at Decebal, but he drew out his rapier and slashed them all like they were cotton candy.

"Dawn Slam!" Cure Dawn gracefully leaped off the roof of a house, did a frontal flip, and smacked Decebal over the head with her glowing yellow nunchucks, sending an explosion of light all over, blinding most of the citizens into covering their eyes, and also scaring others into retreating back to their houses. Thankfully, nothing was destroyed except for some potted plants that tipped over.

The smoke soon faded, revealing a huge pot hole deep in the concrete, with a mud and concrete covered Decebal all the way on the bottom. His body went numb with pain as he gasped for breath, unable to move. He couldn't move even as Marina loomed over him with her fire themed bow and arrow ready to fire, the tip of the flaming arrow pointed right at his face.

"Alright, listen up, broccoli head! You better give us some answers as to who you are and what you've been doing, or you're gonna find yourself being treated for some third degree burns. And no, I am NOT afraid to use this," Marina commanded boldly like she was some big shot military officer. Soon, the feeling returned to Decebal's body as he blasted a gust of wind at Marina, sending her flying.

"Dusk!" Twilight yelped as she caught Dusk in the nick of time, breaking her fall. Decebal flew out of the pothole and into the air with a scornful look.

"You may be powerful, but don't think this'll be the last time you have to deal with me! Adieu!" Decebal howled as he disappeared into thin air.

"Ugh! Why do they always manage to get away just when we're about to give them what they deserve?!" Cure Dusk yelped angrily as Cure Twilight set her down, slamming her fist onto the concrete as she vented her frustration.

"Isn't that kinda how all Pretty Cure villains operate after we defeat the monster of the week? And why do they even leave anyway? What do they do?" Cure Dawn asked curiously, brushing some concrete out of her long ponytail.

"Thanks for coming. I'm sorry I had to interrupt your get-together," Cure Starlight told Twilight.

"It's okay. It's not like you wanted this to happen. You didn't know that green haired guy was gonna show up," Cure Twilight piped in. "Speaking of which, I wanted to invite you too, but Oniichan said you have naginata practice on Thursdays. Sorry."

"It's alright. I should get going now. You'd better get home too," Cure Starlight suggested.

They were met with some cheers from some bystanders, but the Pretty Cures and the fairies didn't want to stay much longer, so they all used the wings on their shoes to fly away from the scene and back to wherever they were before. Cures Twilight, Dawn, Dusk, and the fairies all snuck in through one of Riko's windows, where they were greeted by a curious Kyoya, and turned back to normal.

"A Corrupt Sentinel?" Kyoya asked as they changed back.

"Yep. Mom and Dad didn't ask about us, did they?" Riko asked as she pulled some pieces of gravel out of her hair.

"Nope. They didn't even come upstairs," Kyoya explained. "Saki-san and Rina-chan went to run an errand and last I checked, Arinao-san's in his room working on a novel or something."

"Your dad's a writer?" Marina asked curiously, surprised at this new information. "You never told us that! Is he famous?"

"Is he world famous?" Moonbeam asked.

"No. He wants to be one, though. Last I checked he got a job at a library," Riko replied, a little cowed by their curiosity as she hopped on her bed to preserve her personal space.

"I'm so jealous. I just adore the thought of working in a library. That's what I want to do when I get older!" Starbeam exclaimed happily. "Oh! I want to be a writer, too!"

Once they've calmed down, the kids and fairies went back to hanging out by themselves, happy that the battle was over. But the questions kept lingering in their minds.

Who exactly is this green haired man named Decebal? What's his connection to Zenjin? Why are they working together? Do they have the same goal? Or do they have different reasons for working together? Did Decebal have a hand in destroying Rozaniela, too? There was no way to really know.

Later, Marina went downstairs to get a class of water. The battle with that giant guinea pig and the Shakespearian dressed Decebal took quite a lot of energy out of her. Just as she gulped a good portion of water down her throat…

"How are you liking it?" Arinao's voice asked out of nowhere, prompting Marina to turn around in confusion.

"What?"

"Hanging out here. Are you having fun?" Arinao asked kindly, with a warm smile.

"Yeah. It feels kinda weird though. I guess it's probably because I've never been to a friend's house before. Obvious reasons, of course," Marina replied pertly before taking another sip of water.

"Riko's never had friends come over before either, just so you know," Arinao told her. "People just refused to give her a chance. It's been a very long time since I've seen my daughter so happy. In fact, I've never seen her this happy before. It's all because you kids became her first friends, and seeing her happy just makes me the happiest father in the world."

'_Sappy much?'_ Marina thought pertly, but she didn't want to say it out of fear of making him angry. "You seem like a good dad. Riko's lucky to have you. I wish I had a good dad, instead of an idiot who steals money from people with his power."

"I don't blame you," Arinao said kindly. He then pulled out a sticky note and a pen, wrote something on it, and handed it to Marina just as she finished her glass of water. "This is my cell phone number. If you need anything at all or just want to talk, you're more than welcome to call me or stop by."

Marina found herself frozen with confusion. No one had ever offered to give them their number before. Then again, she had always wanted to exchange numbers with someone, but she wanted it to be with kids her own age so she could call her friends and gossip and exchange secrets. The father of one of her new friends wasn't quite what she had in mind. But he was nice, and despite what she did to his daughter in the past, he forgave her, and he hasn't used her ancestry to define her or judge her, so...perhaps this could be good. Marina slowly took the sticky note from his hand and stuffed it in her pocket. "Thanks," She muttered meekly.

A little after that, Marina, with Sunbeam in her hands, decided to walk back home, as it was almost six, and her mother said she needed to be home by six thirty. After that, Anzu, with Lovebeam in her hands, got on her bike and went home, leaving only Kyoya. Not long after that, Kyoya's parents came to pick him up. They said goodbye at the front porch and Riko went back inside.

But when Riko looked out the window and found Kyoya being loaded into the van, they both found themselves unable to stop waving, like they were going to be separated for a long time, which isn't the case. As soon as the van drove off into that corner that shielded it from Riko's sight, she ran up to her room, began squeeing, and jumped around the room.

"Yeeeek! Best day ever! Meow!" Riko squealed happily as she spun around like a top, jumped all around the room, and made all sorts of happy noises. Soon, Riko lost her balance and fell on her bed, causing some stuffed animals to roll onto the floor. Moonbeam managed to catch the white one with the big brown stain on it and put it back on the bed.

"That sure was fun. We should get together like this again sometime, and Hotaru-Neesan can come too if she's free," Moonbeam chirped.

"Yeah. So this is what it's like to have friends over," Riko mused, losing herself in the happy memories she made hours ago. "I wanna do it again! Hey Moonbeam, wanna watch Moomins with me?"

"Moomins?" Moonbeam asked, confused.

"Yep! It's one of my favorite anime!"

"Sure! I'd love to!"

Riko wished this day could go on forever. Her cup of happiness was full before, but now it was overflowing like a broken drainage pipe. What Riko and Moonbeam didn't know was that Rina stood outside her room, looking rather dismal as she listened to her older sister's merry laughter, rejoicing over her first ever friend get-together going well. She looked down and leaned against the door like she was so tired she didn't want to do anything anymore.

"Why does she have friends and I don't?" Rina mused to herself sadly.

Footnotes:

1\. The Moomins is a series of Finnish-Swedish books by Tove Jansson. Comet In Moominland is technically considered the first book, but there was one that preceded it called Moomin And The Great Flood, which to this day hasn't been released anywhere outside of Finland. It's very popular in Japan.

* * *

**Author's Note: I cut out all the bullying scenes involving Yuji. Yeah, now that I look back, those scenes were pretty pointless.**


	9. Hippies and Countdowns!

Chapter 9: Monsters With Countdowns? Zenjin's Adoptive Mom is a Hippie?

Not much happened within Zenjin's huge black fortress since the gigantic guinea pig incident, but everything was tranquil for them...if by tranquil you mean spending time corrupting people into Corrupt Sentinels (or Zenjin's preferred name for them, Human Trash) far away from the Pretty Cure and seeing what happens if they really do wreak havoc. But instead of letting them wreak havoc on Earth, like Zenjin wanted, Decebal took some souls to the big fortress. He kept them in a big pink force field and let them howl and writhe like lab rats.

In one of the big empty black rooms in the fortress, Decebal watched as a giant black slug writhed around in a pink force field on top of a tall, marble, Ionic styled pedestal towering at almost the same height as him. Zenjin stood next to him, crossing his arms and tapping his left foot.

"I still don't see why we can't just let it blow stuff up on Earth. It's more fun that way!" Zenjin complained as he watched the giant black slug writhe in the force field.

"Now now, Zenjin. You know we've found some strange findings with these creatures, so consider this an experimental period where we discover what they're capable of, so be patient, Zenny boy," Decebal said.

"Pheh! I hate being patient! Nothing ever happens!" Zenjin mused.

"Speaking of nothing happening, I wonder what's taking Beileag so long. It's been two weeks already," Decebal mused. He then noticed that the slug stopped writhing in the force field. "Oh. Time's up," Decebal said as he drew out his rapier and sliced the slug in half. The black sluck dissipated in a flurry of little black lights which also dissipated into the air.

"Yeah. What IS taking her so long anyway? She's supposed to be here by now. I hope nothing's happened to her," Zenjin said as he uncrossed his arms and looked around the empty room. Normally, when people say they hope nothing bad has happened to someone, they usually say it in either a thoughtful, concerned, or worried way. Zenjin's tone was impatient and uncaring.

"Woooow! This is a rockin' bachelor pad! It looks like a floating castle in a fairy tale!" A peppy, cheerful woman voice suddenly pierced the silence of the room, causing Zenjin and Decebal to look toward the door behind them.

A young woman in her mid twenties spiraled into the room like a ballerina. She had long, scraggly, indigo hair tied in two long, low pigtails with pearl shaped accessories. Her eyes were lavender, covered with a huge pair of red glasses shaped like hearts with a white rim framing the red pieces of glass. She was wearing a blue, yellow, and pink tank top underneath a brown, unbuttoned vest with some streamer-like straps stringing on them like alfredo noodles, a pair of ocean blue pants with brightly colored pink and yellow flowers embroidered on the hems in varying sizes, tall, pale brown high heels, a green and yellow bandana wrapped around her right leg, a white, pink, and black bandana wrapped around her left arm just below her shoulder, and a big, beige cycling cap with purple and green diamonds all over the bottom part. She also had a big purple flower pinned on her left breast, just below her tank top strap. Basically, she looked like a hippie who came straight from the 1960s.

"Did you really make this all by yourself, Zen-chan?! This is sooooo cool!" The indigo haired girl squealed happily, oblivious to Zenjin and Decebal looking at her like she crashed a party.

"What took you so long, Beileag?" Decebal asked.

The indigo haired, hippie-like girl suddenly turned around on one of her heels and donned a pouty, squinty eyed angry face. "I told you not to call me Beileag! It's either B-chan or Billie!"

"You're late!" Zenjin sneered in a perturbed tone of voice.

Beileag fell to her knees. "Sorrr-ry! Goodness, you won't believe what the heck happened to me! The queen and her munchkin minions ordered me to help out with cleaning up the mess you made, Zen-chan! I tried to get away a bunch of times, but they just kept making me do chores all over the place! I've lost at least five pounds just from carrying around a bunch of two by fours and pushing carts full of either broken houses or corpses!"

"Yay. I love the smell of death and the sight of rotting corpses," Zenjin mused to himself with a malicious gleam in his bloody red eyes, not that Decebal or Beileag noticed.

The indigo haired, brightly dressed hippie then stood back on her feet. "And do you know how long it took me to figure out the spell to go to your alternate dimension? A whole week! Yep! That's right! A whole entire week! It took me hours and hours just to get the first part of that blasted spell right!" Beileag complained, wagging her finger at Decebal like she was scolding an unruly child.

Decebal gently pushed her hand away from his face. "Well, better late than never, right? We're glad you're here, Billie."

"But man, I mean to tell you, did you really make all of this yourself, Zen-chan? Including this bizarro alternate dimension? For someone who just got the Energia in his bloodstream, you sure did a great job with making all of this!" Beileag exclaimed cheerfully.

"Hey. Are you gonna talk all day or listen, because we've been having some trouble," Zenjin told her with his arms crossed.

"Oh! That's right. Sorry about that, Zen-chan. Hehehehe," Beileag rubbed her hair with one of her hands and laughed ruefully.

Zenjin and Decebal told her about everything that happened, from Zenjin's first encounter with the Pretty Cure to the guinea pig incident a few weeks ago.

"Human Trash? Couldn't you have come up with some with a little more pizzazz? Or something more mystical and intimidating? Like the obscure, or the sentinels, or the vampire beasts-" Beileag mused.

"They're MY creations, and I can call them whatever I want and you don't, so don't question my way of doing things, you hippie!" Zenjin screamed, his eyes bloodshot in response to Beileag's train of thought. "You care way more about the way my creations are named than the fact that these trashy little idiots are ruining my fun?!"

"Of course I do, Zen-chan!" Beileag exclaimed, standing up from Zenjin's bed on her own two feet, taking few steps away from Zenjin's high pitched yelling. "But there's no need to yell at me!" She snapped. She then cleared her throat. "So these superhero girls are called Pretty Cure, right?"

"Yes, and they've been getting in our way quite a lot. The only reason we haven't done anything in the past two weeks is because we've been conducting some experiments," Decebal told her with a shrug.

"You mean those ones you were just telling me about, right? I can see why you'd want to do them in private. They sound pretty nosy," Beileag mused.

Decebal shot a demeaning glance at her. "Focus, Beileag!"

"Don't call me that!"

"We need to come up with a new plan of action if we're going to run into those pesky little doll faced brats again. They may be cute little dolls, but they may get stronger later on, so we shouldn't underestimate them," Decebal explained, calmer this time, then turned to Zenjin, who was happily chomping on some strawberry pocky. "You have the Energia's omnipotent power, don't you, Zenny? Can't you just kill them or erase them from existence?"

"I could, since I have all the power in the world to do so. But I don't feel like it. They'll make some pretty good toys. Plus, all I want to do is make people suffer. Destroying the world is so cliché," Zenjin replied as he chewed on a huge chunk of his strawberry pocky.

"Don't talk with your mouth full. It's rude," Beileag piped in.

"Who cares? You're not my mom!" Zenjin snapped back and threw the empty pocky box at her. Swiftly, she managed to catch it and allow a purple flame to consume it, erasing it from existence.

"Hmm...come to think of it," Decebal said as he looked up at the ceiling with his wistful, cherry red eyes, with a hand on his chin, pondering. "They don't know about our discovery, do they?"

* * *

Rina sat in her extremely colorful room, playing with some new Barbie dolls she got for her birthday, dressing it up in a brand new sparkly pink outfit that came with it. She's dressed in a filmy snow white shirt with a big red heart on it, navy blue jeans with pink and red glittering hearts sewn on various parts of them, dark yellow socks, and sparkly silver shoes. She also has a little yellow ribbon on top of her head of straight, silky, raven black hair.

She picked up a little purple hair brush and carefully brushed Barbie's perfect, beautiful, curling golden hair, making sure all the knots are loose and the split ends are gone. But soon, the energy to brush her hair further just sapped right out of her, causing the seven year old to sigh.

"I'm sorry, Barbie. I know it's my job to make you pretty and stylish, but it's been four weeks and I still have no friends at my new school! Everyone runs away from me like I'm gonna give them all germs or something, and I take a bath every day!" Rina told her stylish looking Barbie doll, who is made of plastic. The doll remained silent and still as a mannequin. "Worse than that, Riko's the one who has friends! She isn't supposed to have friends! She's weird and makes strange noises and makes everybody stare at us with her pretend superhero dreams and talking about stuff nobody likes and crying at anything and everything."

Again, Barbie said nothing.

"Rina! Breakfast is ready! You better eat it before it gets cold!" Saki called out.

"I'll be down in a second, Mom!" Rina called back, then put Barbie on her bed before putting a small blanket on her. "Sorry, Barbie. Time for your seven hour nap. I have to go to school again," Rina said as she grabbed her purple Dora The Explorer book bag and hopped out of her room. She skipped into the dining room to find Hikage scarfing down some French toast and Arinao reading the paper as usual. She found Riko sitting in the den fully dressed and ready, playing her Nintendo DS while Saki sat in front of the TV, watching the news quite intently.

Later, Riko, Rina, and Saki drove off to school. Riko managed to find Anzu on the blacktop. "Hi, An-chan!"

"Hey Riko! Check this out! Some people recorded our fight with the guinea pig and it's all over YouTube! Look!" Anzu exclaimed excitedly, running up to her and showing her the video footage, with Kyoya and Marina running behind her.

"Huh? Seriously?" Riko remembered that kid she shooed away. Perhaps he posted it up. It seemed like the most likely scenario.

"Really? Lemme see," Marina asked as she, Kyoya, and Riko peered into Anzu's cell phone, watching the shaky footage of the Pretty Cures fighting the giant black guinea pig. Then, as the guinea pig was knocked unconscious, the shaky footage zoomed in on it, showing a glowing green set of numbers.

"Huh?"

"What's up, Kyoya-kun?" Anzu asked.

"Let me see that for a second," Kyoya said as he took the cell phone from Anzu's hands and examined the video further. He then showed it to the girls again. "Do you see what I see?"

The girls looked closer. They saw green, glowing numbers next to the guinea pig's arm. 00:15:41. 00:15:40. 00:15:39.

"Wow! You're right! What is that?" Marina asked.

"Is that a timer?" Anzu asked as Kyoya paused the video on the phone, keeping the 00:15:39 frozen so they could see it better.

"No. The numbers are going down backwards, so I think it might be a countdown," Kyoya explained.

"But what's it counting down to? Is it some kind of time limit?" Marina asked.

"Probably. This freeze frame says there's fifteen minutes and thirty nine seconds left. Left to what?" The bell rang right then and there, so nobody could answer.

Kids hung out in their designated cliques, and Mrs. Omori just sat at her desk grading papers. Riko pulled out a paper and a turquoise mechanical pencil and drew on it, hoping to sketch out little drawings of the fairy sisters. Anzu just sat at her desk and stared off into space. Kyoya pulled out a a manga and read it. Marina worked on some homework.

Before long, Riko found herself unable to draw anymore. The drawings she did etch out looked very off model. Sunbeam's left ear was too small, her right eye was too big, the sun on her tail looked too squiggly, and one of Moonbeam's ears was far too big, shaped like a big oval. Riko crumpled up her paper and threw it into the trash can.

Unbeknownst to them, Fukiko slowly and hesitantly approached the occupied Kyoya. Her chocolate brown hair was still in its usual style, down to her upper back with the little ponytail held up by a little green scrunchie, wearing a black skirt, a long sleeved dark blue jean jacket over a white shirt with the words _Follow Your Heart_ written on it in purple and turquoise, with glitter on them, and a pair of white and purple.

Once she got close to Kyoya, who continued to read his book, completely oblivious to her presence, she took a step back a little bit. She folded her hands together to the point where her knuckles looked like they were going to turn snow white. Her hazel eyes trembled a little bit fearfully, but she shook her head and took a breath before finally speaking.

"Umm...Kyoya-kun?" Fukiko asked shyly. Kyoya didn't respond. He just kept on reading his book. But she kept going.

'_I have to do this,'_ She told herself in her mind, motivating herself to speak again. "Listen, um…" Her voice cracked with hesitation, but she went on. "I...I really want to say I'm sorry...for what I've done to you…"

He didn't respond again.

"Hey, Fu-chan! You've gotta check out Toshiko-chan's new earrings!" Another girl exclaimed cheerfully as she hopped in front of the bewildered girl, took her by the hand, and dragged her away from Kyoya. Riko looked up upon hearing Fukiko talk to him, but she didn't dare say anything. But she did manage to overhear the conversation. By accident, of course, since her hearing was hypersensitive despite the noise the other kids were making.

Some questions lingered in Riko's mind. _'Why is Fukiko apologizing? Did she do something bad to him? If she did, it definitely explains why Kyoya doesn't like her and gets mad whenever she's mentioned. Or maybe she's apologizing because of that weird and inappropriate sounding question she asked me?_' Riko wished she could ask Fukiko about it, but she looked like one of the popular girls, the ones who wouldn't really bother with talking to someone like her.

Getting through the school day felt like an eternity. Unfortunately for Riko, Mr. Ikari was going over new math problems on the board, and despite her scribbling down some notes as best she could, she couldn't understand the new equations they were learning. Her eyes blurred, and she discovered some wet, dark marks on her worksheet. She rubbed her eyes with her sleeves, but the tears didn't stop. She could hear herself sniveling.

Strangely enough, she felt a gentle tap on her shoulder, causing her to flinch and move away a little. "Hey. You okay?" Riko opened her eyes to find Fukiko looking at her with concern and pity in her voice. Riko shook her head and continued to scribble down some notes.

Once math, lunch, recess, and science were out of the way, at health class, Riko had to go to the bathroom. She unknowingly brought her purse with her. After she finished, she went out the bathroom door only to find herself bumping into another body.

"Oh! I'm so sorry!"

"Watch where you're going! Loser!" An irritated female voice snapped. Once Riko collected herself, she noticed that the girl she bumped into was one of Yoshie's frends.

A girl with frumpy but curly pale brown hair dangling down to her shoulders and dark blue eyes. She had black heart shaped earrings on both of her ears with glittering edges, wearing a white and pink short sleeved shirt with a black heart and a sparkling silver crown picture on the chest and abdomen, a dark blue jean skirt, black leggings, and slip on silver shoes. She had a small, sunny yellow purse in her hand.

Riko looked down to find that her own purse was on the floor, with one of her Pokemon mangas exposed. The clip on the purse was unfastened when Riko fell, so the book came spiraling out. Riko grabbed her book and put it back in her bag quickly.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to do that. Honest," Riko told her apologetically again, but Toshiko continued to give her a scornful, squinty eyed look. It didn't look like she believed her.

"Whatever. You actually like Pokemon?" Toshiko sneered irritably. When she asked the last question, Riko froze. She didn't want to say anything. But her silence gave the fashionably dressed girl the answer she needed, and not in a good way. "My brother has a lot of Pokemon stuff. But he's nine years old. The right age. Aren't you a little old to be watching cartoons?"

Riko didn't like the tone in her voice. "No. You'd be surprised at the amount of grown ups who like cartoons!"

"They must have no life, and with the way you're going, you'll probably be just like them."

"You don't know that."

"And another thing. You'd be way more popular if you actually wore some pretty dresses and skirts. Now out of my way," Toshiko retorted venomously before bumping Riko as she walked into the bathroom. Despite having endured a situation like this lots of times before, Riko never did get used to it.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the final bell's ringing echoed all throughout the school, signaling that the kids could finally go home. Riko was about to find Saki's car until the sound of yelling froze her in her tracks.

"WHAT?! What do you mean you won't take me shopping?!" Someone barked into their cell phone angrily. Riko didn't dare turn around, but she recognized the voice. It sounded like Toshiko, the prissy girl who confronted her in the bathroom before.

"Mom! I told you it wasn't me! Stupid Yuuta broke it! Oh, fine! Blame me for everything he does! You always take his side anyway!" Toshiko screamed to the point where her voice went up an octave. She angrily pressed the END button on her cell phone, hastily stuffed it in her yellow purse, stamped one of her feet and screeched to the air.

"What's wrong, Toshi-chan?" Shizuka asked curiously.

"My mom won't take me shopping because my baby brother's sick and my stupid little brother Yuuta told her I was the one who broke one of her glass unicorns! I didn't do it, but does she believe me? Noooo! Now I'm grounded for a week because I didn't clean up my room and have to go straight home or else no I-pod either!" Toshiko complained.

"I feel you. My big brother is always scheming stuff and picking on me, but he never goes too far with it, and Mom and Dad usually know when he's lying or trying to pull some kind of trick."

"Lucky. I have to go. I'll catch you later, okay?"

"Sure. Bye!"

With that, Riko ran to Saki's car, and she found herself home at last.

* * *

It took Toshiko about five minutes to get home, but as soon as she opened the door, the first thing she heard was two little boys, aged nine and seven, running all over the place, carrying little plastic toy swords, swatting each other and shouting over dramatic battle cries. A baby's screechy wailing could be heard in another room, and a woman with frizzy pale brown hair that looked like it'd been pulled on a lot popped out of nowhere and bags under her eyes.

"Toshiko! What took you so long?!" She yelled, causing the already bewildered girl to freeze with fear. "Ugh! Don't bother. I better give him his medicine. Tell the boys to quit horsing around! It's bad enough Yuuta broke one of my glass unicorns!"

'_Oh, NOW you believe me! Go suck it,'_ Toshiko thought sarcastically as she ran to her battling brothers, yanked the plastic swords out of their hands, and threw them in the closet.

"Hey! What'd you do that for?!" The younger one whined petulantly.

"I was just about to kick his butt!" The older one piped in.

"Enough playing! Go and do your homework!" Toshiko commanded.

"Why should we?" The younger one asked.

"Because you have to! Now march!" Toshiko snapped.

"You tell us to do our homework yet you never do yours and always complain about it," The older one retorted.

"Just go and do it!" Toshiko snapped. The two boys finally conceded defeat and went back to their rooms. The baby's crying continued to echo in the nursery as Toshiko's mother tried to give him some medicine.

"Where's Dad at?" Toshiko asked.

"How should I know where he is? He's probably out frolicking with his friends and having a good time while I have to slave away here! Go and wash the dishes, will you?!" Toshiko's mother snapped angrily, causing the baby to cry even more.

Toshiko went into the kitchen and saw at least two tall piles of dirty dishes in the sink. The piles weren't as tall and wobbly as Toshiko expected them to be. She wanted to complain, but she knew that if she did, her mother would yell, so she reluctantly decided to work on them. She turned on the faucet, sprayed some detergent in the sink once it was full of water, scrubbed whatever leftovers she could off the plates, and put them all in the empty dishwasher one by one. It took her half an hour to rinse and scrub everything, but after that, the sink became practically empty. The baby's crying finally ceased.

"Done and done. Maybe now I can finally work on some of my own homework," Toshiko muttered to herself irritably as she washed her soapy hands with the dish towel. As soon as she left the kitchen, the front door flung open.

"I'm back!" A man's voice called out.

"Hey Dad," Toshiko said. But it got drowned out by her mother stomping into the living room and staring him down with a very ferocious look.

"Where in the world have you been? Oh, let me guess! You were out frolicking with your friends? Playing pachinko? Having a good time, not caring one bit about your sick baby? I'm sick of you always being away when I need your help the most!" Toshiko's mother yelled.

'_Ugh! I don't want to hear this!'_ Toshiko groaned in her head as she stomped to her really messy room and shut the door. She wanted to listen to her I-pod to drown it out, but her mother grounded her and was forbidding her from using it.

Her room looked like a tornado had gone through it. Flashy, sparkly, perfectly fashionable clothes strung about everywhere. Shirts, skirts, jewelry, jeans, even tank tops scattered all over the place. Lots of fashion magazines lay scattered on her floor, too, either closed or half-open.

Toshiko silently picked up some shirts, folded them all neatly, and proceeded to put them all in her drawers. She also put other articles of clothing on clothing hangers and put them in her closet, like her jeans and various shirts and skirts.

It took her about fifteen minutes to put all of her clothes away, and another five picking up all the magazines and putting them underneath her bed. With that, her room now looked like it hadn't been touched. She finally put her bag on her bed, pulled out her computer chair, and began surfing the internet.

She only managed to get on there for about a second until her mother stomped into the room. "Toshiko! I need to talk to you! Turn off the computer!" She exclaimed.

"I have homework to do," Toshiko sneered back.

But before she could open Microsoft Word and start on whatever homework she had, the screen suddenly went black. "What?! Mom!" Toshiko yelled, having stood up in alarm.

"When I say turn off the computer, I mean turn off the computer, not go online and expose yourself to internet creeps!"

"But I was gonna do my homework-"

"Toshiko! Care to explain to me why you didn't your laundry like I asked you to?"

"You never told me I had to do laundry! You keep on yelling about my room and the dishes, and I did them just now!"

"You're so inconsiderate! You never help me out around the house! I'm always the one who has to do everything around here! You need to understand that being selfish and locking yourself in your room and acting like a brat isn't going to do anything for you!"

Something snapped inside Toshiko. She was helpless to stop it. But then again, she didn't want to contain it. She slammed her hand on the keyboard with a strong thud. "Hey! I just told you I cleaned my room and did the dishes! Even after all that the first thing you do is yell at me?! This is why I hate helping out around the house! You never say thanks or I appreciate it or this means so much to me! All you ever do is yell, scream, complain, and act like everything has to be about you!"

"Don't take that attitude with me-"

"No! I'm talking! You listen for once! I've been considerate ever since Dad got laid off! I've studied my butt off, put up with Yuuta and Kouta, and helped out whenever you asked me! And after all of this, you have the nerve to call ME inconsiderate?! Do you expect me to be perfect or something?! If this is how you're going to keep treating me when I even TRY to do nice things for you, then I'm DONE being considerate! If anything, you're the one who's inconsiderate!"

"Toshiko-"

Toshiko dashed out the door, passing right by the oldest brother, Yuuta. She almost bumped into him, but he managed to get out of the way just in the nick of time. "She being a brat again?"

With an exhausted grunt, Toshiko's mother plopped onto her daughter's bed and ran her hands through her stringy hair. But she did see that her room was clean. Not one article of clothing in sight. Toshiko said she cleaned her room. She was right. A touch of regret began to creep into her heart. She wished she hadn't been so hysterical.

Toshiko managed to run out the front door and out into the road. What she didn't know was that she passed a young man with long, sterling silver hair, black attire, crimson red boots, and a crimson red cape. He backed away as soon as she passed right by him. About a few minutes afterward, Toshiko's frazzled but no longer angry mother came out the front door.

"Toshiko! Where are you!?" She cried out. But she didn't shout it in an angry way this time. She used a worried and concerned tone of voice. Her puffy eyes no longer donned the exhausted look they had. But she turned around to find the silver haired teenager staring at her with eyes so wide they looked like they were going to pop out of his head. The only thing in them was naked fear.

"Can I help you?" Toshiko's mother asked. The silver haired teenager took a few steps back and suddenly bolted in the direction Toshiko ran into.

* * *

Toshiko didn't get to go very far as she was still wearing her slip on shoes, and they weren't made for running. She only managed to get down two streets. She saw a rusty little silver bench in front of a bus stop and plopped herself onto it, her legs burning with exhaustion.

She saw someone contentedly walking their dog on the sidewalk on the other side of the street. She saw some birds flying over her head and twittering away happily, like they didn't have a care in the world. _'I wish I could be a bird. I could fly wherever I wanted, and I wouldn't have to suck up to stupid people like Mom and feel unappreciated for everything I do,'_ Toshiko looked down at her feet, still covered with the slip on shoes. She removed one of them and found a small scab on her ankle, probably from the back of her shoe rubbing against it.

"Ow…" Toshiko grimaced as she touched the peeled skin on her ankle. Her eyesight began to blur, and she felt something wet trickle down her cheeks. She rubbed her face with her arm and found that her arm was wet and gleaming under the afternoon sun. Not from the peeling skin on her ankle, but the anger in her heart finally cooling off and morphing into sadness. Her ears did catch the sound of harmonica music echoing in the air, but she wasn't in the mood for listening to music.

"Why does Mom have to be such an idiot? Can't she at least be happy I actually washed the dishes and cleaned my room? She's never happy when I help her out around the house!" Toshiko mused to herself tearfully, throwing her glittering shoe on the concrete in front of her. But when it stopped, she looked up and saw that it stopped in front of the silver haired teenager she passed right by.

"Oh! Sorry! I didn't see you there!" Toshiko stammered as she stood up, stumbled to her fallen shoe, and picked it back up. But she froze when she saw the stone faced, crimson eyed stare he was giving her. He didn't look angry, but she could tell he didn't look very happy about the shoe almost flying in his face.

"I heard your argument with your mother earlier," The silver haired boy told her. The harmonica music stopped at this point, not that Toshiko or the silver haired boy cared.

"You did? Yeah. I'm not having the best of days. I really just want to get away from her for a while," Toshiko replied sheepishly as she brushed the tears out of her face with her arm, embarrassed that someone heard her argument and is seeing her cry right now.

"You know...you could do away with her if you want," He whispered coldly.

"Huh?"

"You hate her, don't you?" Toshiko felt a chill spring forth all throughout her body. The silver haired boy's eyes suddenly donned a ferocious gleam, and the smile he flashed made him look like a serial killer who wanted to go on a killing spree. She wanted to run, but her legs were still heavy from too much running earlier.

"You're scaring me. What do you mean by do away with her?" Toshiko stammered.

"You're angry at her. You want to give her what she deserves, make her suffer for always making you suffer. I know exactly how you feel. I've been through it myself. But if you want, I'd be more than happy to help you give her the punishment she deserves," Zenjin replied coldly, with a touch of enjoyment peppering his unusually high voice, like he was absolutely dying to do whatever it is he wants to do.

"How?"

* * *

"Aww! Why'd you stop playing?!" Lovebeam whined as she and Anzu sat in the park where the giant guinea pig was when they fought it. Anzu sat on a bench, and she found herself unable to continue playing her harmonica. She still held onto it, but she looked down at it with her lime green eyes downcast, like she's too tired to continue doing anything.

"Sorry, Lovebeam. I just...I just don't feel motivated today. Normally I enjoy it, but now I'm just too tired," Anzu explained in a low, exhausted sounding voice just after sighing.

"Why? Did something bad happen?" Lovebeam asked with concern peppering her voice, the whiny tone vanishing.

"My mom is giving Dad a hard time," Anzu replied with the same cadence as before.

"Why?"

"She hates my dad. She's fighting for custody of me, but I want no part of it."

Lovebeam was about to ask why until a chill consumed her body, causing her long ears to suddenly rise straight into the air. "Uh!"

"What's wrong?" Anzu asked.

"I feel Zenjin's presence!" Lovebeam chirped.

"I better call the others and let them know," Anzu said as she pulled out a grey and white Droid phone. She found the people she wanted to call and said the same thing to all three of them. "Zenjin's up to no good again. I'm at the park where we fought the giant guinea pig. You better get here quick!"

Anzu herself decided to transform into Cure Dawn right then and there. Right after she transformed, a high pitched, bloodcurdling scream resounded in the air.

Cure Dawn and Lovebeam both wasted no time in leaping into the scene, where they found Zenjin corrupting someone's soul, with the green haired man from before, Decebal, by his side. Strapped onto a big wall with her Soul Portal exposed for all to see and invade was Toshiko, one of Yoshie's lackeys.

"Go crazy, Human Trash!" Zenjin yelled as the black orb glowed, grew bigger in size, and morphed into a pitch black lizard. It wasn't as big as the other monsters they fought before, but it still looked powerful.

"A lizard? D'awww! Why can't it be something cooler, like a grizzly bear or something?!" Zenjin growled angrily, stamping his feet on the concrete while Decebal just shrugged.

"Now now, Zenny boy. If you set your expectations too high, you'll always come out disappointed in the end," Decebal piped in.

"Don't think you're so smart, you knaves!" The bold voice of Cure Starlight resounded in the air as she, along with Cures Twilight, Dawn, and Dusk, leaped into the scene. Suddenly, the black lizard began charging at them, its skinny little legs making it look like its waddling.

Cure Twilight was the first to act. She hopped in front of the giant lizard, brought her cat claws out, and slashed the lizard's face without any mercy. The lizard howled as it backed a few steps away, allowing Cure Dawn to leap into the air and land a strong punch on the top of its head with one of her yellow flaming fists. Cure Starlight unleashed a Starlight Shower on the lizard, which writhed in pain as the stars fell on it like meteors falling from the sky.

"_My mom never appreciates what I do! She's always yelling and complaining!"_ The lizard cried despondently.

"Huh? Isn't that Shiina-san?" Cure Twilight asked as she noticed Toshiko, unconscious and hanging on the wall.

"This lizard is her soul?" Cure Dusk asked. "Hmph! Let's just leave her alone. She's not worth it."

"Uh...Asagi? You DO know we're supposed to be superheroes, right? It's our job to save and protect everybody!" Cure Twilight exclaimed, confused by Cure Dusk's sudden lack of concern.

"Come on! She's one of Inoue's lackeys! I couldn't care less about her! She can go die in a fire for all I care! Besides, it's not like she's gonna automatically turn nice and good when we DO save her," Cure Dusk explained rather ambivalently as Cure Starlight managed to slash the lizard's back with her naginata. Cure Dawn managed to drop some rolling kicks on it and send it flying into some trees.

Cure Twilight found herself dumbfounded by the sudden change in Marina's demeanor. Truth be told, she was stunned, and not in a good way. _'Wow. I've never seen Mari-chan act like that before. I don't know what she went through, but it must have been harsh. But wishing death on someone? Really?_' She had to wonder if this was the same Marina she befriended. But she knew one thing for sure: that attitude was not acceptable in this situation.

"_She calls me inconsiderate, but she acts way more inconsiderate than I do! No one appreciates anything I do! No one ever says thank you to me! I'm sick of being treated like this whenever I do nice things for people!"_ The lizard yelled as it popped right back out and used its tail to knock Cure Dawn away.

"Dawn!" Being agile, Cure Twilight leaped in front of Cure Dawn and caught the yellow girl before she could fall on the concrete, saving her from potential brain damage or even death.

"Thanks, Twi," Cure Dawn replied sheepishly.

"No prob! That's what friends are for!" Twilight flashed a sweet smile as she put Dawn back on the sidewalk. Twilight then turned around and gave Dusk a scrutinizing look. "I don't like Shiina-san any more than you do. But I hated you at first and I saved you, didn't I? Either you're in, or you're out!"

"My, I've never seen a superhero say that she wants to leave a poor victim to her misery. That's quite a revolutionary feat if I do say so myself," Decebal said as Zenjin teleported away without a second thought.

"Hey! I know you!" Lovebeam suddenly shouted. "Didn't you used to be one of King Ghislain's royal guard?!"

"Wait, what?!" Twilight, Dawn, and Dusk suddenly exclaimed in unison, their eyes wide with confusion.

"He's an attendant in your king's castle?!" Dusk yelped.

"Girls! Help! This countdown says we have forty minutes and twenty five seconds left!" Starlight exclaimed as she punched the lizard in the face before it retaliated by swatting her with its head.

"I might as well," Cure Dusk deadpanned as she charged at the lizard with her fists bursting into spheres of writhing orange flames. "Dusk Fire Punch!" She shouted as she punched the lizard in the jaw and sent it flying. But she didn't stop there.

"This is what you get for being a prissy snob and pretending to be my friend, Shiina!" Cure Dusk shouted with fire blazing in her golden eyes as a ring of fire danced around her body.

"Mandarin Dusk Inferno!" With a few movements of her arms, a huge tornado of fire exploded from underneath her feet, made a blazing arc in the sky, and completely swallowed the giant lizard like it was a predator dying to consume its prey. The black lizard writhed and howled in pain as it felt the skin on its body be burned off.

"Dusk! Be careful!" Cure Twilight shouted angrily.

Much to everyone's surprise, the tornado of fire suddenly stopped. The giant lizard became nothing more than thin air, leaving behind Toshiko's soul. Cure Twilight grabbed it, ran over to Toshiko, and put it back in her Soul Portal. She then stomped over to a frazzled Cure Dusk, stamping her feet. The sound of her stamping gave her an odd satisfaction. "What's with you?! You always yell at me to be careful or someone'll get killed, and here you go making a big tornado of fire!"

"That stupid Shiina girl deserves it for making a fool out of me last year!" Cure Dusk snapped back.

"Even so, you could have set the whole forest on fire! You need to be more careful with using your powers! People could die if we just use them willy nilly! You're the one always telling ME that! And we're superheroes! It's our job to save people no matter what, and you actually want her to die?! Superheroes don't wish death on people!" Cure Twilight snapped back harshly.

"Get outta my face!" Cure Dusk shouted, pushing Cure Twilight out of her personal space, unknowingly making her fall on the sidewalk via her rear. "We should never have bothered saving her! She actually deserves to suffer! Serves her right for playing me for a fool!"

"Dusk. Stop," Dusk felt a strong grip on her arm, turning around to find Cure Starlight, with a scrutinizing, stern look on her face, freezing her in place and sizing her up. "I don't know what happened between you and Shiina, but you should never let your anger get the better of you, especially when lives are at stake. If you really feel the need to be angry, know that there is a time and a place to express it."

"This is why women should never be superheroes, or even do anything at all. They always fight over stupid things and let their emotions get the better of them," Decebal piped in.

"Shut up, broccoli head!" Twilight, Dawn, and Lovebeam shouted in perfect unison.

"You just proved my point!" Decebal snapped back.

Cure Dusk had to admit, both Twilight and Starlight had good points. She discovered new powers, but went overboard with them and almost set the forest on fire. Thankfully, no trees got burned even though she left a big black mark on some grass, erasing them from existence. The boiling anger dying to burst out of her heart like an explosion finally died down, and she lowered her arm, allowing Cure Starlight to let go. She looked down at the sidewalk she stood on and stamped her foot on it at least three times. Cure Twilight helped herself up. But instead of confronting Marina, she turned to Decebal with her own scrutinizing look.

"Alright, we want answers so you better spill the beans! Do you know anything about the countdown on the monsters we fought?!" Cure Twilight asked loudly and boldly, balling her fists like she wanted to punch him.

"I really don't see how this all important information will do you any good, but if you really must know, I suppose I can take the liberty of telling you. The monsters you call Corrupt Sentinels are all on a one hour time limit. You have to defeat them within the hour or…" He left the last sentence drift away.

"Or what?! Spill it?!" Twilight hissed.

"Take four guesses," Decebal deadpanned.

"Turn back to normal?" Anzu asked.

"Be monsters forever and ever?" Riko asked.

"The person who's been corrupted will die?" Hotaru asked grimly.

The green haired man snapped his fingers jubilantly. "Ding ding ding! Bingo! You win the prize!" Decebal exclaimed like he was some game show host before cleareing his throat. "Ahem. Almost, anyway. If you don't defeat the monster after the one hour mark, even if you purify it and put the souls back in the Soul Portals, the person will be dead forever and ever. I have some errands to run, so I really hope you'll accept your place in society and do away with your little superhero act, if you want to stay alive. Ta-ta!" With that, Decebal disappeared into the air.

"Uuuuugh! I freaking hate that Shakespeare dressed, broccoli headed sexist pig!" Cure Dusk screamed as she turned back to normal and proceeded to kick an old, rusty red fire hydrant multiple times, not feeling very satisfied with the outcome of the fight.

"Lovebeam. You said he used to work under your king. Care to explain some more?" Anzu asked gently.

"Yes. Our noble King Ghislain hired him when he was younger. It was a side job for him. His other job was an actor in a theater troupe. But at one point he got fired," Lovebeam explained.

"What for?" Riko asked.

"He didn't say. But I heard other people say he was fired because he questioned the king and queen's motives for ruling Rozaniela. But later on, he got rehired. To be perfectly honest, I never did like that Decebal guy! He was always too classy for his own good. I tried to tell the king and queen that rehiring him was a bad idea, but did they listen to me? Noooo!" Lovebeam elaborated, then whined petulantly at that last part.

"That's stupid," Marina piped in.

"So...if we don't purify the Corrupt Sentinels in an hour, the people will die for good?" Riko mused sadly.

"But it's good that we know this now. We can plan new battle strategies and work even harder at maintaining peace. That's a super hero's duty," Hotaru told them reassuringly, trying to instill some relief. But in her proud little heart, doubt swirled around like a whirlpool, just like everyone else.

"I'm tired. I need to cool off," Marina grunted as she stretched her arms out and walked away.

"I'm gonna go to Kyo-chan's house for the day," Lovebeam piped in as she flew away. Everyone else decided to retire for the day as well. Unbeknownst to them, Toshiko woke up and found her head pulsating from the inside.

"Ugh! What happened to me?" Toshiko complained as she stammered to her feet.

* * *

Rina laid on her bed, staring at the ceiling with the little flower shaped shades surrounding the lit up light bulbs. A big stuffed unicorn sat beside her, with a frizzy but beautiful pale purple mane and tail, soft white fur, a gold and silver horn, beady black eyes, pink reins dangling from its mouth, and pink hooves. She tossed on her bed and hugged her big unicorn plush, holding it so close and so tight it felt like she didn't want to let it go no matter what.

"Still no friends, Miss Unicorn," Rina said into her unicorn's fur, her voice muffled. She closed her eyes and found herself walking on the flashback sidewalk, even though she clearly didn't want to.

(flashback)

_At Hikaribashi Elementary, which was a simple one storied building unlike both the middle school and high school, where Riko and Hikage each go to, Rina found herself on the school's blacktop, all by herself in an ocean of happy children chasing each other, screaming, hanging out with their designated cliques, or playing some kind of game, like jump rope or four square. There were so many kids on the blacktop, she felt like a black sheep in a flock of white sheep. Who should she talk to? Would they invite her to play their games or would they reject her and act like she isn't there? Like usual._

_Then she noticed three girls clustered together, talking about something. Upon closer inspection, Rina couldn't believe her eyes. One girl had a pretty shirt with a unicorn on it! _'I like unicorns, too! If she likes unicorns like me, she can be my friend!'_ Rina thought with resolve in her heart. She remembered the lessons she learned about making friends at her last school. Say hi first. Talk nicely. Say please or thank you. Ask if you can play. Smile. Talk about things you both like. Compliment them. Be nice about it, too. She found herself in front of the girls, particularly the unicorn shirt girl in question._

"_Hello!" Rina chirped sweetly, causing the trio of giggling girls to turn around and freeze her in place with their flummoxed eyes. Rina did feel a little uncomfortable by the stares, but she shrugged off the feeling a kept going. "I really like your unicorn shirt."_

"_You do?" The unicorn shirt girl asked._

"_Yep! I like unicorns too! I'm Rina! Can I join you and your friends?" Rina piped in cheerfully, keeping a sweet smile. The three girls looked at each other with confused but uninterested faces._

"_Sorry, but we're busy," The unicorn shirt girl said. She and her two other friends suddenly dashed to another part of the blacktop, leaving Rina despondent and all alone._

'Don't give up now. There's lots of other kids here. Maybe there'll be some other people who'll want to be your friend,'_ Rina told herself as she saw some girls playing jump rope a few feet away and walked over to them._

"_Hi! That looks like fun. May I please join you?" Rina asked as sweetly and politely as she could._

"_No. You're not invited. Go play somewhere else," One girl sneered as one of her friends stopped playing jump rope._

_She tried again._

"_Ooh! I like your earrings! They're pretty!"_

"_Can you, like, stay out of our space and go somewhere else?"_

_Rina's shoulders slumped and she turned around to walk away, her heart having been stepped on once again. But another idea popped into her mind. If she couldn't make friends with girls her own age, who's to say she can't be friends with boys? But then again, boys like video games and skateboarding and making messes and action figures. They don't like unicorns or Barbies or playing dress up or jewelry. But there's nothing wrong with wanting to talk about new things. Besides, there's got to be some boys who like unicorns and Barbies, weird as that may sound. She saw two boys and approached them._

"_Hello!" Rina said. "May I please join you?"_

"_Buzz off, prissy! You're just gonna give us cooties!" One slightly overweight, frizzy haired boy snapped, causing Rina to flinch and take a few steps back in fright._

"_There's no such thing as cooties!" She shouted after shaking off her initial surprise._

"_Whatever. We're not interested in playing pwetty pwetty princesses and having tea parties! Go away!" The plump boy shouted as he took his friend and went to another part of the blacktop._

_Rina thought her heart got broken before, but now she was surprised there were still any pieces left. She tried and tried the best she could, but they all coldly rejected her. Without anything more to do, she sat on the grass and watched the kids play and do their thing until the teachers called for everyone to line up and go back to their classes._

(end flashback)

"Why don't I have any friends? Why do they hate me? I'm not ugly and I'm not gonna give them germs or cooties, and none of them even met Oneechan. Why?" Some tears melted into Miss Unicorn's fur. But two other questions kept lingering in her mind, and that made her more confused than anything.

"I had lots and lots of friends at my last school, so why don't they like me? And how come Riko's the one that has friends now and I don't?" She wished she had the answer to that question, but she didn't.


	10. Kyoya and Riko Fight?

Chapter 10: Kyoya and Riko Fight?! A Misunderstanding Between Friends!

The day after Marina almost went nuts with power, Riko saw something about Kyoya she never saw before.

It was on a Friday during gym class, when all the kids were shooting baskets in the gymnasium. Not for a professional game or anything. Just for fun. The gymnasium floor was overrun with children on two differing teams, playing a mock game of basketball for some physical exercise, the sound of their squeaking shoes, their jubilant, competitive shouts, and the bouncing of basketballs scenting the air with excitement. They were all wearing plain white T-shirts and shorts of varying lengths and colors (No, not those underwear-like bloomers. I hate those). Other kids, like Riko, Marina, and Anzu, sat on the stage at the end of the gym, as they haven't been called in to switch with other kids yet.

"Sorry I pushed you yesterday, Riko," Marina muttered in a low but apologetic voice.

"It's okay. I'm used to it," Riko replied softly. An opportunity to ask the question appeared before her, but she was unsure of whether she should take it or not. Would Marina get angry when she asked, or just ignore her and continue on with the game? Would she even give an answer at all? Riko thought about dropping the subject out of fear of hurting her feelings, getting a cold reception, or just plain getting yelled at. However, in her mind, she knew she had to ask. "So...if you don't mind me asking, what did Shiina-san do to you that was so bad?"

"She and Anzu transferred here when we were in the fifth grade," Marina began with a slight grumble, continuing to stare down at her knees as her legs dangled from the edge of the stage they were sitting on. "She approached me and said she wanted to be my friend. I had doubts, but I was so happy that somebody wanted to be my friend, I didn't care. But she always made me carry her books around and left me out whenever she talked with Inoue and Amami. Then I overheard her laughing with Amami in the bathroom once," Marina balled her fists and her eyes trembled with slight anger.

"As it turned out, she was only pretending to be my friend when she was actually planning to betray me long afterward. She wanted to make me beat someone else up to get me kicked out of school to prove to everyone that I really was going to be just like that man…" She cracked her knuckles, her eyes aglow with irritation. "I punched her out right then and there, but I got three detentions for it. God, I should never have been such an idiot! She reeled me right in and I fell for it like a fool."

"Ouch. Sorry about that," Riko mused softly. Her heart went out to Marina. No wonder she wanted to leave Toshiko to die. If Riko went through that, she'd never forgive both herself and the people using her. In fact, she'd want to beat them up and punish them for what they did, just like Marina. "Now I see why you hate her so much. I get it. I'd probably do the same thing you did if that ever happened to me."

"I'll bet. It would have been better if she hated me from the start, like everyone else did. She really didn't have to take advantage of my wish like that. What did I ever do to her that was so bad? God, don't you just hate it when people blame you for stuff you didn't do and never believe you when you try to tell them otherwise?" Marina piped in.

"Yeah. Teachers at one school I went to thought I was a straight up bad kid because I covered my ears at loud noises, cried whenever they yelled, and couldn't be normal like other kids. I kinda know something's wrong with me, and I really don't care about being normal or popular or cool, but I wish they didn't have to make such a big deal out of it. They all made it sound like I killed someone or robbed a bank!" Riko replied.

"Ouch. With someone like me I can understand, but you? Just for not being like everyone else? Jeez. That's just overkill," Marina exclaimed. The angry glow in her eyes disappeared, replaced with a soft, warm one, just as warm as the feeling creeping into her heart. "But now...I kinda wish I met you back then. Maybe we could have been friends, kinda like...we're trying to be now. I'd probably do a better job at it than I am now," Marina whispered softly, in a wistful tone of voice this time.

Riko smiled.

"By the way, I've been meaning to ask. Why _did_ you save me when Zenjin turned my soul into a giant fox? I picked on you, so you should have just ran in the other direction. I know other people would have. But why'd you save me?" Marina asked in a low whisper.

Riko didn't waste even a millisecond answering. "If I didn't know the real you, I probably would have. But I saw you being nice to the little kitten. Fern, was it? Yeah, that's it. Bullies aren't nice to animals. If you were nice to a cat, then you can't be a bad person, even though you acted like one. Plus, it'd be wrong to just leave you there to get beat up. If someone's getting hurt, you should help them, right? I've seen too many stories where people die and others could have saved them but choose not to," Riko explained as lucidly as she could.

Marina was speechless. She couldn't find it in her to say anything. She knew Riko was kind before, but she went that far just for her, the girl who harassed her on her first day of school and took her anger out on her for stupid reasons. Marina looked away as she could feel her face burn, not with embarrassment but with joy, just like how her heart was burning with that same warmth...and she never thought she'd ever see the day where she'd actually have a real friend, a genuine one didn't pick on her or use her for her own gain.

"Ack! The ball!" One of the basketballs bounced outside the gym.

"I'll get it!" Riko yelled as she leaped off the stage and went after the ball. Riko wasn't cognizant of the fact that a warm, soft smile creeped onto Marina's blunt little face.

It would have been easy if the ball hadn't been going really fast and bouncing all over the place. It went really far by the time Riko rushed out of the gym. It took her a short while, but she saw the ball slowly roll into the nurse's office, as the door was open. Quietly, Riko caught up to the ball and picked it up. She was about to go back to the gym until she saw something in there that kept her frozen in place, not out of fear, but of an intense curiosity and wonder.

It was Kyoya, with his hands tightly gripped on some parallel bars, struggling to walk all on his own.

A female nurse with short blonde hair stood next to him with a clipboard in her hands, silently watching as the red haired boy struggled to put one foot in front of the other. The bars themselves didn't look very new. They looked like makeshift ones made from wood. His knuckles, gripping the parallel bars for dear life, looked snow white from where Riko was standing. Even though Kyoya was standing up straight, he hunched forward just a little bit. His legs looked like they didn't want to carry his weight despite being straight. His left foot, exposed and without a sneaker to cover it, managed to pull itself in front of him, followed by his right foot a little bit afterward. The process repeated itself, and Riko noticed that there were always pauses between putting one foot in front of the other.

Kyoya's face, despite looking a little contorted, had the look of someone who was completely determined to walk again. He kept looking forward, never changing direction. It didn't look like he wanted to stop either. One foot in front of the other.

That was when Riko noticed it: he didn't complain. He never grunted, whined, or cried out from the pain, if there was any pain. He just kept on going silently, with that same fierce, contorted, determined look on both his pale face and his stunning green eyes, aglow like they were saying, _'I'm gonna do this and nobody's gonna stop me!'_

Suddenly, one of his feet gave out, but he managed to stop himself from falling. The nurse gripped his arm right as he almost fell, saving him from the inevitable. It helped that both of his hands were still tightly gripping the parallel bars like they were superglued to them. He silently pulled himself back on his feet. He could have cried out, but he didn't.

But before she could watch him attempt to do it again, she came back to reality when he turned his head to see her at the entrance, flashed his familiar, sweet smile, and finally peeled one of his hands off of one of the bars to wave. This made the nurse notice her presence too, and she silently waved as well. Riko wasn't sure what to do, but she did remember Saki saying that if someone waves at you, it's best to wave back, so she did just that.

"There you are. We have to go," Anzu's voice suddenly appeared out of nowhere, causing Riko to jump a little in fright as she turned around to find the blonde haired girl behind her.

"Okay. Sorry about that," Riko said as she waved goodbye to Kyoya and gingerly followed Anzu out. "He's so strong."

"What's that?" Anzu asked.

"I wonder if his legs hurt when he tries to walk on them? If it does, he didn't cry out or make noises or anything like that. He just kept on trying. I wish I could be strong like he is," Riko mused wistfully.

Anzu smiled. "Yeah. I've never heard him talk about his disability or his sessions. Those are why he's exempt from gym class."

"What does exempt mean?"

"How do I explain it...Oh! Here's a good one. If your legs don't work and you get a note from the doctor that says you can't go to gym class, that means you're exempt."

"Ohhh. I get it. Yeah, I did notice he never goes to gym class, but I never got to ask him why. Now I know."

* * *

That was yesterday. On Saturday, Kyoya suddenly wheeled to the Tasogare house unexpectedly to hang out. They kept a ramp on their porch since his previous visit in case he wanted to drop by again. Riko couldn't believe her luck, and found herself jumping around the house cheering wildly and flapping her hands up and down, much to Kyoya's slight confusion and Rina's very vocal displeasure.

Hikage suggested he take Riko and Kyoya for a nice little walk in town, to get them out of the house for a bit. At first, Arinao and Saki were reluctant since neither Riko or Kyoya had a cell phones, but Hikage did, and it was fully charged. Plus, he had been out on his own lots of times before, so they agreed and offered to pick them up when they were done with whatever they wanted to do. With that, Hikage took Kyoya and Riko out on a town excursion. They made sure to watch the crosswalk signs and traffic signals when crossing the streets.

"Hey. Wanna run into the dollar store with me? I want to pick up some new pencils and binders," Hikage asked kindly.

"Sure," Riko muttered. She then turned to Kyoya, who wheeled next to her. "Have you gone out on your own before?"

"Yep. Lots of times. Even in the rain," Kyoya replied rather casually.

Riko couldn't help but tilt her head to one side, her mind slightly flummoxed by the casual way he mentioned it. "In the rain?"

"Just in my manual wheelchair. My electric one and rain don't mix," He clarified.

"But isn't that a bit dangerous? Won't you get hurt going around in a wheelchair all by yourself?" She asked innocently with mild worry peppering her sweet, gentle voice. "I mean, what if some guy tried to rob you with a knife? How would you be able to defend yourself?"

"See this thing here?" Kyoya said as he pointed to one of the shoulder straps on the white and green backpack sitting on his lap. Riko peered in closer to see a black plastic protrusion with what appeared to be a round, silver key ring on it with a black Nylon strap dangling from it. "This is called an I-Safe. I pull this string here and it sets off an alarm that's so loud it can drive anybody away."

"Oh yeah. I remember seeing commercials for those. I wish I had one."

"My dad got this for me after the accident for safety purposes."

"He's smart. With all the criminals hanging around, no place is ever truly safe."

"Actually, I hear Japan is one of the safest countries around."

"I don't believe that. There's always criminals around every corner! You never know what to expect! That's why Mom and Dad tell me never to go out on my own."

Kyoya was about to say more until he felt one side of his wheelchair suddenly drop, like the ground below one of the wheels suddenly dropped out from under him. "Wah!"

"Kyo-chan!" Right as that happened, Riko managed to grab one of the back handles of the wheelchair and keep him from falling into a large pothole next to the curb. It wasn't very deep, but certainly deep enough for an entire wheelchair wheel to fall into and cause Kyoya to get hurt, and it was about the size of a manhole cover. Even though Riko managed to catch him in the nick of time, the electric wheelchair and Kyoya combined proved to be quite heavy, and she couldn't pull him out right off.

Then an idea hatched in her head like a newly hatching baby chick. Slowly, while keeping one hand on the handle, she crept to the other side of the pothole, put one hand on one of the arm rests, and moved her other hand on the other back handle. Unlike when she was a Pretty Cure, Riko didn't have much muscle strength in her body. But there were cars going by them, and Kyoya had been in one car accident already. She didn't want to potentially lose her first friend. With a great heave, she pushed Kyoya's wheelchair out of the pothole and onto a safe part of the street where cars didn't pass right by them.

As soon as the whole ordeal ended, Riko found herself panting and heaving like she ran a marathon. "Whoa. Thanks for the help, Ri-chan," He said, flashing a smile. Riko couldn't believe he kept on smiling even after he almost got hurt.

"You're...welcome…" Riko panted croaked in between breaths. But inside, her heart is cheering and doing backflips joyously. _'Wow! I literally just saved Kyo-chan's life and actually did something right for once! Yaaaay!'_ She thought about actually voicing this sentiment, boy did she want to. But Hikage called out to them from the parking lot in front of the dollar store.

"Hurry up, you two! Be sure to watch for cars!" Hikage called out to them.

"We'll be there in a second, Niichan!" Riko called back in a loud voice.

"Shall we go?" Kyoya asked sweetly, offering his hand to her.

"You bet!" Riko chirped back and found her hand interlocking with his as he moved his other hand on the joystick of his chair.

"Hey, your hands are soft," Kyoya piped in.

"Thanks. Lots of people tell me that," Riko replied sheepishly, but she actually didn't mind at all. She had to admit, Kyoya's hands were soft too, much softer than the hands of other boys. Usually male hands were rough or cracked from too much physical exercise or very arduous work. But neither of them minded. They kept holding hands until they went into the dollar store.

Riko couldn't quite believe she managed to get here on foot with Hikage and Kyoya at her side. Usually she only came here with at least one of her parents, and by car, no less, only when running an errand. She was out on her own. Well, with her brother and male friend, yes, but it didn't make things any less surprising to her. As they searched through the aisles, Hikage went in a separate aisle while she kept walking behind Kyoya at all times so she wouldn't get in his way.

"You gonna buy anything?" Riko asked.

"Yeah. Maybe a snack or two. I have money," Kyoya replied sweetly. But he eyed a part of an aisle and saw some toothbrushes. "Oh! I do need a new toothbrush."

When Kyoya wheeled in front of the aisle with the toothbrushes, which are directly above him, he stopped and very slowly pulled himself out of his wheelchair. Riko backed away a couple steps to give him room, but she had to wonder why he was getting out of his wheelchair. Was he practicing trying to stand up? That seemed to be the most likely possibility.

"Do you need any help?" Riko blurted out.

"No, I'm good. Thanks, though," Kyoya replied sweetly as he was about to reach for one of the toothbrushes, particularly an emerald green one that looked nice.

But right as he was about to grab it, the toothbrush was suddenly swiped out from right in front of him as soon as his hand was within reach. Kyoya slumped back into his wheelchair as he and Riko fixated their flummoxed gazes upon a mousy woman with long, curling caramel hair. She was wearing heavy crimson red lipstick, thick blue eye shadow, a dark blue jean jacket over a sunny yellow tank top, a black office lady's skirt, purple leggings and black high heels. With a wide smile, she handed Kyoya the toothbrush.

"Here you go!" The lady exclaimed as she handed the toothbrush to him.

Riko and Kyoya turned to look at each other for a few seconds, wondering where the heck she sprung forth from. The red haired boy shyly took the toothbrush from her. "Thanks?"

"You're welcome!" The lady said, her relentlessly bubbly smile persisting on her plump face.

Riko and Kyoya left the aisle and continued to look around the dollar store. But whenever they turned their heads to look behind them every once in a while, they would see that flashy, bubbly looking lady behind them looking at various items in the same aisles they were in. _'She's starting to scare me, and it's not because of her lipstick and eye shadow either,'_ Riko thought. Kyoya did find other things he wanted, like a new pencil sharpener and a set of colored pencils. They were both in his reach and he wouldn't have had any trouble getting them. But when he tried to get them, the caramel haired lipstick eye shadow woman snatched them away and then handed them to him like he dropped them. When Kyoya went to pay for his purchases, the cashier put his purchases in a plastic bag and was about to hand it to him, but the lady took the bag from the cashier.

"I'll carry this for you, sweetie," The heavy lipstick and eye shadow lady said in a sweet voice.

'_Uhhh...she's helping him and he doesn't even have to ask for it?! Why couldn't people do that with me?! Kyo-chan's so lucky! But I wish she'd back off a bit. She's getting into our personal space and she smells like she sprayed violet perfume all over herself,'_ Riko thought, growing annoyed by her persistence and the strong smell of violet perfume assaulting her nostrils. But what Riko didn't know was that Kyoya kept giving her dirty looks, like he was really wishing she'd back off and mind her own business. The woman even followed them out the door.

"Can I have my bag, please?" Kyoya asked in a monotone voice, like he was trying to hide some irritability.

"Here you go, sweetie. You have a good day," The caramel haired woman said sweetly as she handed him the plastic bag and skipped away to wherever it is her home is located, leaving a confused Riko and a slightly irritable Kyoya in front of the dollar store.

"That was...weird," Riko muttered.

"Tell me about it," Kyoya deadpanned.

"Do you know her?"

"No, and I don't want to."

"Hey, you guys!" Hikage's friendly, cheerful sounding voice snapped them out of their reveries as he very happily popped out from the entrance of the dollar store with a plastic bag in his hand. "You'll never believe this! I finally found a copy of the 1989 Tim Burton Batman movie! God, I've been looking for this thing since I saw it at Takuro's sleepover three years ago!"

"I didn't know you like Batman," Kyoya replied, his usual casual smile returning to his face, pushing his initial irritability to the side.

"I'm not too crazy about it, but I like it. Hey, what'd you get?" Hikage replied with a laugh.

"He got a toothbrush, colored pencils, and a pencil sharpener. I didn't get anything," Riko told him.

"Okay. Want to head on home?" Hikage asked. Riko and Kyoya nodded and stayed behind Hikage as they walked away from the dollar store.

However, Riko couldn't quite get that prissy looking lady out of her head, and it wasn't because of her heavy lipstick, eye shadow, and tendency to get into their personal space, either. The caramel haired lady actually went out of her way to help Kyoya with everything. She even offered to carry his bag while they left the dollar store. She never met anyone who was that nice to someone before. Better yet, she wished she had someone help her without asking like that. A pang of jealousy shot through her heart which caused her to speak.

"That lady was kinda weird. But she sure was nice, though," Riko chirped.

"Yeah," Kyoya said in a low, uninterested voice as he wheeled next to her.

Riko clasped her two hands together and looked up at the sunny sky with a somewhat happy glow in her dark green eyes. "She helped you with everything and you didn't even have to ask for it. I have to admit, you're lucky to have people help you with stuff like that."

It was here that Kyoya's face suddenly grew dark, and he silently stopped in his tracks. He stared down at the shopping bag on his lap, a glare on his glasses obscuring his eyes from view. His sweet smile was wiped off of his face like a rag washing spilled milk on someone's counter. Unfortunately, Riko was still talking and walking, completely oblivious to Kyoya's change in demeanor.

It took a few minute for Riko to finally notice that Kyoya wasn't next to her. She looked behind her to find Kyoya sitting five feet from her.

"Ack! Did I walk too fast? Sorry!" Riko yelped as she walked back over to him. But she did notice he kept looking down at the shopping bag on his lap, his glasses covered eyes downcast, not with sadness, but with anger, like someone insulted him. "Is something wrong? You look angry."

At first, Kyoya said nothing, and continued to stare down at his lap. But he curled one of his hands into a fist and could feel his fingernails digging into his palms. "Are you serious?" He muttered in a low voice.

"Huh? What was that?" Riko asked, confused and not quite sure why his voice suddenly got low. But she could recognize the tone all too well.

"Do you actually think I _like_ having people do things for me that I can clearly do by myself?" Kyoya grumbled, slightly louder this time, but not to a point where Riko had to cover her ears. He gripped his armrests tighter than usual, like he wanted his hands to go snow white.

Riko cocked her head to one side, not quite comprehending what he just said nor the meaning of it. "Uhh...what does that mean?"

'_I can't believe it. She thinks I can't do anything on my own, just like that lady and everyone else. I can't believe I'm still so stupid as to believe I could find someone who doesn't pity me or see me as a broken thing they can protect or scorn to make themselves look good,'_ Kyoya thought bitterly. An image of himself in a dark room with a group of kids, three boys and one girl, leaving him in the spotlight and walking further and further away from him flashed through his mind like a fast moving film reel. Unable to contain his rage, he slammed his fist into an armrest and stared daggers at a frightened Riko, who took a few steps back.

"You're an idiot, you know that!" Kyoya shouted, causing Riko to cover her ears. With that piece of rhetoric, Kyoya moved the joystick on his chair and took off in another direction, leaving a frightened and flummoxed Riko all alone on the sidewalk. Once he was gone, she slowly removed her hands from her ears, but her heart is now a sea of confusion with ferocious sharks swimming in it.

"Did I...do something wrong again? As usual? What did I do this time?!" Riko asked softly at first, then louder.

"What's up, Riko? Where's Kyoya?" Hikage asked as he popped up from behind Riko.

"He said to go on ahead of him," Riko blurted out without thinking. It wasn't quite because she didn't want him to know. In fact, in a way, she still didn't quite understand what happened just now. _'Should I tell him, or should I not? Ugh! I don't know what to do! I don't even get what just happened!'_ Riko thought as she and Hikage decided to return home by themselves, trusting that Kyoya made it home by himself without difficulty.

However, instead of a sea of confusion, Riko's heart had been pierced and broken, now a sea of sorrow, the pieces of her broken heart drowning with questions. Why did Kyoya call her an idiot? He usually never did that and was always nice to her. Did she say something she shouldn't have? Riko always knew she had a tendency to do that, and people usually did call her out on it, very loudly and cruelly at that, but how is she supposed to just know what's appropriate to say and what isn't?

He did say something like how she seems to think he likes having people help him with stuff he can do himself, but what is that supposed to mean? The concept is just a big, tangled cobweb she couldn't quite untangle. Perhaps when she gets home, she can ask Saki about it. Maybe she can help. She always knows what to say and always manages to make things she doesn't know about easier to understand. Arinao would have been better, but as far as she knew, he was at work today and won't be home until night time. But then again, Saki might be out walking Yumiko. So that left one other person…

* * *

"Ugh!" Kyoya picked up a random stone from the ground and growled as he threw it at a nearby tree. The rock made a click sound as it peeled off a piece of old bark and bounced onto the ground until it stopped dead in its tracks.

But it wasn't enough to squelch the boiling lava spilling out of his inner volcano. After that, he angrily tried to swing his legs back and forth. They moved, but they felt more like squiggly noodles dangling from a wall than his legs swinging back and forth. After that, he hung his shopping bag on one of the back handles of his wheelchair and crossed his arms.

"I hate this. I hate it when they do that. Treat me like I'm some broken kid who can't do anything on his own. Pheh!" Kyoya muttered irritably as he smacked his fist onto one of his armrests. "She actually had the nerve to say I was lucky! What does she know?! Nothing, that's what! She's just like the rest of them! They all look at me with those pitying eyes that say, _'Poor widdle wheelchair boy! He can't do anything at all because his legs are broken! It's such a pity! Let's help him and treat him like he's brain dead so we can feel good about ourselves!'_ They can all suck it," Kyoya growled vehemently and smacked his armrest again.

The boiling lava didn't stop flowing, but after yelling out his frustrations, the flow lessened somewhat, which also gave him time to remember his lashing out at her. Upon further reflection, when he looked at Riko, she really did look like she genuinely didn't know what the heck he was talking about. Her eyes trembled and were full of confusion, surprised by his completely random outburst.

She truly had been nice to him since the beginning of school, though that was because he was nice to her first. They laughed together, hung out together, talked about their interests, and not once did Riko ever exclude him or treat him like he was some broken toy that needed fixing. But then again, maybe she was acting. Was she just that good at pretending to be his friend? He wished he could figure out the answer. He still wished she didn't say that he was lucky to have that prissy caramel haired lady fawn over him and act like she was his maid.

He wanted to be lost in his thoughts some more. But a loud, yippy barking sound pulled him out of his reverie. The sound shocked him into turning around and seeing a woman trying to kneel down and calm a very yippy little miniature Australian shepherd.

"Yumiko!" The woman kneeled down to the dog's level, finally put some fingers down into her collar, and put her other hand right around the yippy little dog's muzzle. "No! We do not bark at friends! Bad!" The woman told the dog in a firm voice.

A miniature Australian shepherd? Yumiko? "Saki?" He finally blurted out.

"Huh? Kyoya-kun! Hi there!" Saki chirped with a smile as she walked over to Kyoya, keeping her hand tight around Yumiko's red leash.

"Taking Yumiko for a walk?" Kyoya asked sheepishly.

"Yes. She's rather high strung, so I make it a point to take her out every three hours. Sorry about her barking earlier. She can be pretty yippy around strangers. What are you doing here?" Saki explained as she saw a bench near where Kyoya is and sat down.

Kyoya crossed his arms. "I just wanted to stroll around a little. It sucks staying in the house all day," Kyoya replied.

"But weren't you with Hikage and Riko earlier?" Saki asked. Kyoya fell silent and kept his arms crossed. But Saki could clearly see his contorted mad face, even though the red haired, bespectacled boy tried to hide it. "Something's bothering you. Would you like to talk about it? I'll listen. But if you don't want to, that's fine."

Another thought struck Kyoya's mind like a bolt of lightning. Riko might think he's broken, but Saki might not think so. Children and their parents aren't the same. Maybe she'll understand. He really didn't want to take another risk, but he had to try, so why not? He sighed and uncrossed his arms, letting them slump on his lap as Yumiko cheerfully leaped onto Saki's lap. "...Riko and I got into a bit of a fight earlier."

"What happened? That's unusual."

"While we were in the dollar store, some lady kept helping me with stuff even though I could do it all by myself. She acted like she was my maid. I wanted to tell her to back off, but I didn't want to make a scene. Later on, Riko said I was lucky to have people helping me with stuff like that."

Saki sweatdropped and chuckled a bit. "Did she?" _'Oh no. It's finally happened. I knew it. He must have misinterpreted it,'_ Saki thought.

"It's not funny!" Kyoya snapped. "I hate it when people help me with stuff like I'm some brain dead kid who has to have everybody do everything for them! They all think that just because I'm in a wheelchair, it automatically means I can't do anything on my own! Ever! I'm not brain dead! I...I thought Riko was different from them," His voice caught in his throat for a little bit upon remembering Riko and all the times she was nice to him. "She actually treated me like a person, and she never brought up my disability, but here she goes and says I'm lucky to have them help me, like she was saying that I like having people pity me and help me with stuff I can clearly do myself!"

"I see. I can see where you're coming from, even though I'm not disabled myself. However, I will say this: while I do agree that what Riko said was a tad inappropriate, I guarantee she didn't mean it to be rude or pitying or offensive, and I really don't think she pities you or makes a big deal out of your disability," Saki told him kindly, stroking Yumiko's fur.

"How can you be so sure?" Kyoya asked in a softer voice this time. But the fact that Saki was Riko's mother flashed through his mind, and he immediately wished he hadn't said that.

"I'm her mother, that's why. I actually know how this whole thing started. If you want, I can tell you," Saki said.

"What is it?"

"Let me ask this first: do you know what Autism is?" Saki asked.

Kyoya crossed his arms, closed his eyes, and tried to think. Some answers popped up, but he didn't know if they were accurate or not. "Isn't that some kind of brain disorder? I heard about it on TV."

"Yes. It's a neurological disorder that affects how a person perceives the world, particularly with how they see, feel, and experience things and the way the brain processes new information," Saki began. "See, Riko's brain is wired differently from others'. She has difficulty acting in ways other people perceive as _'normal.'_ For her it's hard to talk to people, look them in the eye, and she has a tendency to display odd characteristics like flapping her hands and rocking back and forth when she's stressed."

'_Look them in the eye?'_ Kyoya thought. Right as Saki mentioned the part with autistic people not looking people in the eye, a memory flashed through his brain. He did notice that Riko hardly ever looked people in the eye, not even among her friends. He remembered asking her about it once, and she replied it was a habit, nothing else.

"Autistic people also have a hard time recognizing facial expressions and knowing what's appropriate to say and what isn't, so they have to be taught those things be scratch. I think I understand now. Riko might have said something she didn't know was offensive and rude. I'm sure she didn't mean it. Heck, I guarantee you that she doesn't even know what the word pity means, nor might she be able to understand the concept of helping someone because they think the person they're helping can't do anything on their own just because they have a single disability," Saki explained. "And she might have used a tone of voice that wasn't appropriate. She does have an unfortunate tendency to say inappropriate things that get mistaken as rude or mean, but it's never to be so. But her Autism makes her unable to differentiate what's appropriate to say and what isn't, from the tone of her voice to the words she puts together."

Kyoya silently took in Saki's explanation, and with every word that came out of her mouth and every memory of Riko being nice to him without being overly sensitive or protective flashing through his mind, he began to feel more and more like he completely ruined their friendship. Riko never did make eye contact, but he never found that to be an issue. She did cover her ears when the kids yelled and screamed loudly, and that was understandable. He did see her flap her hands up and down once when she got stressed out, but he never found that to be an issue either, even though other kids might have. But if she really has a brain disorder like that, and really doesn't understand a concept like pitying someone, then she really was being genuinely kind to him all along!

Worse than that, he called her an idiot for it.

"Awwww!" Kyoya groaned loudly as he pushed his hands through his wild red hair, bending downward. "I'm so freaking stupid! I wish I knew this earlier! I can't believe I thought she was implying that I liked having people treat me like I'm brain dead! I called her an idiot, but I'm the _real_ idiot around here!" He wailed ruefully, burying his face in his hands, pushing his glasses upward. How could he have been so terrible to the one person who's actually been consistently kind to him? He wished he could turn back time and change it so he wouldn't have lashed out at her like that. She didn't deserve that. What did she do to deserve it? Nothing, that's what. "I'm sorry, Saki-san. I'm horrible."

"You're not. You're not the first person to misconstrue what she said. We've been trying to rectify this for a while, but Riko still has a long way to go. But I think I know what she really meant when she said you were lucky. I think when she saw that lady helping you out without you asking, she felt jealous. When she was younger, people who were supposed to help her when she needed it absolutely refused to do so, mainly because they were convinced she was a straight up bad kid and that Autism was just a flimsy excuse for bad behavior," Saki told him. Kyoya couldn't help but be surprised she isn't yelling at him or berating him for his stupidity.

"Really?" Kyoya asked as he pulled his face out of his hands to listen more. Upon further rumination, he did hear Riko say something similar and elaborate on it, but at that time, he was too consumed by his anger to bother listening.

"Yes. She's not a bad kid by any means, and she never has been. But we used to live in a part of town where people were very closed-minded. They didn't believe Autism was an actual disability, just a flimsy excuse parents made up to justify _'bad behavior.'_ One teacher even told us to our face that Arinao and I were bad parents who don't discipline her correctly, but in reality, Riko was the best behaved out of all of them," Saki explained as Yumiko hopped back down on the ground.

Kyoya's anger disappeared into thin air. He found himself feeling like a pile of bricks was duct taped to his body. His shoulders sagged, and he felt empty inside, with a big gaping hole of guilt wide open in his heart for all to see. To think he thought he had it bad. He took what Riko said the wrong way and possibly ruined their hard earned friendship just like that. He knew he had to fix it. If he didn't, Riko would probably think Kyoya hates her for life, and he doesn't want her to be friendless and guilt-ridden. An image of four other boys and one girl flashed through his mind again, but he didn't want to think about them right now.

"Thanks for telling me all of this, Tasogare-san. I really want to go and apologize," Kyoya said.

"Do you want to come right now?" Saki asked.

"I'd like to, but I have to be home by one because Dad has to go to work, and I have homework to do," Kyoya replied ruefully. Oh, how he yearned to just go to Riko's house and apologize to her. But then again, she might not be in the mood to deal with him right now.

"I see. Well, I have to go home myself. I'm glad I could be of some help. But I will say this though: thank you for being her friend," Saki told him kindly as she stood up from the bench. "Riko really is sweet. It's just nobody ever gives her a chance. It makes me happy you're her first friend, and while I don't approve of you calling her an idiot, I don't think she'll hold it against you. The problem is, she blames herself for pretty much everything that goes on in life, mainly because of what that wretched school did to her, so if she gets paranoid and thinks you don't want to be her friend anymore and will hate her forever, try not to take it seriously."

"Okay. See ya."

"I'll see you later," Saki said as she waved and let Yumiko drag her away from the area. With that, Kyoya rolled the big wheels on his manual wheelchair and strolled away, happy to at least know that Riko didn't mean anything bad by that comment, nor was she ever intending to make him feel bad. But he still wished he hadn't doubted her and lashed out at her in the first place.

Then again, how could he have known she was autistic? It's not like it's firsthand knowledge, and it's not like she even knows about anything that he went through. But more than anything, he wanted nothing more than to apologize to her and finally squelch the guilt that was eating at his heart.

* * *

Around the same time Saki ran into Kyoya, Riko and Hikage walked right into the door. Rina wasn't home right now because she was at a weekend piano lesson, which gave Sunbeam free reign to do whatever she wanted. Riko's in charge of Sunbeam this weekend. But as of now, Sunbeam was still in Riko's room. Once Hikage put his stuff down, he turned toward Riko with a concerned look.

"Want to tell me what happened?" Hikage asked.

"What do you mean?" Riko asked back. _'Oh no! Did he find out?! Is he angry?! Is he gonna blame me if I tell him?!'_ Riko thought hysterically, but she didn't voice them.

"I heard him shout back there. Did something happen?" Hikage asked again. "I won't get mad."

'_There's no denying it. I better face the music and receive my punishment,'_ Riko thought bitterly as she told Hikage about the prissy lady who kept helping Kyoya with everything in the store, Riko and Kyoya talking, and then Kyoya lashing out at her and leaving.

"Do you remember saying anything to him before he yelled?" Hikage asked.

"Uhh...oh! I do! But all I said was that he was lucky to have people help him out all the time and not have to ask for it," Riko replied.

"Ohhh. I get it now," Hikage said as he sat down on the living room couch. "I think that was it."

"What was what?"

"I think I get why he was angry. But it might take some explaining. Let's say for example...you're in a wheelchair and there's someone doing everything for you, so much so that she just won't leave you alone. She'll even want to help you chew your food. Would you like that?" Hikage explained.

Riko crossed her arms and ruminated. "I wouldn't mind if it was explaining stuff I don't get and standing up to bullies, but chewing my food for me? Ugh! No!" She replied, disgusted by the thought of someone chewing someone else's food for them.

"Alright. Then later on, you find out this person is only helping you because she thinks that because you're in a wheelchair, you're so broken you can't do anything, even though it's just your legs that don't work. Would you like that?"

It took a bit of time for Riko to untangle that cobweb, but she managed to comprehend what Hikage was saying. "Helping me because she thinks I can't do anything at all? No, I wouldn't like that."

"See where I'm going with this, Riko? I think Kyoya was angry at that woman for helping him with stuff he can already do on his own, and when you said he was lucky to have her help him, I think he took it as you saying that he can't do anything on his own _because_ he's in a wheelchair," Hikage explained, hoping Riko would get it this time.

"WHAT?!" Riko yelped loudly. Since Rina, Saki, and Arinao aren't here right now, Riko considered it okay to yelp with surprise. She couldn't believe it! Kyoya thinks she thinks he can't do anything at all because he's in a wheelchair? That can't be right! She remembered Fukiko asking her if she was freaked out by his being in a wheelchair, and that scared her quite a bit. She could understand not liking someone because they're in a wheelchair, but thinking that one disability instantly means being incapable of looking after themselves? Is that why the lady at the dollar store helped him? Because she thought he couldn't do it himself simply because he's in a wheelchair? Who thinks that? In some way, Riko could relate.

She was NOT going to let Kyoya go through life thinking Riko only befriended him because she thinks he's helpless and needs to be protected from everything.

"No no no no no! That was absolutely NOT what I meant AT ALL!" Riko shouted. "The only reason I said he was lucky was because the woman was helping him without him asking for it, and nobody did that for me when I was little! I was just jealous! I thought she was being nice! I didn't know she was being overbearing! How am I supposed to know the difference?" After that, she stopped yelling and stared down at her bare feet, her emerald eyes downcast and her voice trembling sadly. "I don't think he's weak and helpless at all. He's strong...way stronger than me. I passed by the nurse's office once and I saw him trying to walk again. It must hurt trying to get back on his feet, but he never complained or anything. He just kept on getting back up and going. Plus he's good at lots of things, like math and telling jokes," Some tears started dripping out of her eyes.

Hikage smiled sweetly and rubbed his little sister's hair. "I know you didn't mean anything bad by it. You just don't know what's appropriate to say and what not to. But you really shouldn't put people on the spot when it comes to personal stuff, y'know. Would you like it if someone told you really loudly, _'Is it true you flap your hands and rock back and forth?'_ in front of people?" Hikage told her gently.

"No."

"I think that's how he felt. But I think he'll understand if you explain to him that your disability makes you unable to know what's appropriate to say, what tone of voice to use, and what words to use."

"Uuuugh!" Riko wailed as she slumped onto the couch next to him. "Why do I always do this?! People always think everything I say is bad when I don't mean it to be! Now my first ever friend is gonna hate me forever and not want to be my friend anymore all because I hurt his feelings and didn't mean to!" Riko cried hysterically.

"Calm down. You don't know that," Hikage told her calmly, putting a firm hand on her shoulder, but it's not working.

"But it always happens! The minute I open my mouth, people automatically decide I'm a bad kid and decide they hate me forever! Now I completely ruined my friendship with Kyo-chan and it'll probably never be fixed!"

"What did I tell you about jumping to conclusions?"

"I need the phone!" Riko exclaimed as she tried to get up from the couch. "I have to say I'm sorry NOW!"

Hikage grabbed her arm and stopped her from going into the kitchen. "I don't think that's a good idea. He might not want to talk right now."

"But I have to say I'm sorry NOW! If I don't tell him he's gonna get the wrong idea and hate me forever! He'll think I don't feel bad about what I said!" Riko protested.

"I think he will. But I think you both need time to cool off. Get some rest. That way, you can think about what you're going to say and talk to each other without feeling so stressed," Hikage told her calmly and gently.

"But I don't wanna wait! I don't wanna spend my whole weekend feeling bad and feeling like everyone's treating me like I killed someone!"

"Nobody's treating you like you killed someone. You don't need to freak out. Let's wait until Monday and you can apologize to him then. I think it'd be better if you told him face to face," Hikage said.

With that, Riko pulled his arm off of her, dashed into her room, plopped onto her bed, and cried into a huge white stuffed animal with a big brown stain on it's big, hippo-like nose. "I'm so sorry, Kyo-chan! I don't think you're helpless because you're in a wheelchair! That's not what I was saying! I should never have said what I said! Better yet, why can't I be mute?!"

"Can you keep it down, please? My head's pounding and I'm not feeling too good," Sunbeam piped in as she was reading one of Riko's beloved Moomin books, _Finn Family Moomintroll_.

Oh, how Riko yearned to apologize to the first friend she ever made RIGHT NOW. She wanted to teleport to his house and apologize to him profusely and fix the damage she unknowingly caused. Now she understood why Kyoya lashed out at her-he thought she was implying that he can't do anything on his own and is happy people help him when they should mind their own business. She buried her face into her stuffed animals, wishing, wishing, and wishing with all of her might that Monday come already so she can apologize.

The weekend felt like it was being stretched out like really long white dough people use to make pizza with. All Riko could possibly think about was how to apologize to Kyoya, even though she managed to set aside time for homework. She knew that if she forgot about her homework and didn't do it, her teachers would get mad or even give her a detention, and Riko really didn't want to have to stay after school because of her own carelessness.

Oddly enough, Rina didn't pick on her the whole weekend. Even she found Riko's constant worrying and persistent anxiety to be quite unsettling, and just didn't have it in her to pick on her. In fact, Rina couldn't help but feel her heart break inside seeing her older sister looking like she had a really bad day. Once Riko finished her homework, when her parents and Hikage weren't looking, she grabbed the phone, ran to her room, and called the Mitomo house, unable to endure waiting any longer. The phone rang a few times, but no answer. She called again two hours later. No answer. After that, she gave up, mainly because if she tried to call again, her parents and Hikage would know about it and tell her she shouldn't call so much. It'll make them think she's trying to stalk them. Riko wanted to contradict them, but she knew they had a point, so she stopped and tried to go through the rest of the grueling weekend.

She had to admit, though, the good thing about this weekend is that Zenjin, Decebal, and the Corrupt Sentinels aren't around to make things worse for them. If they started causing trouble, Riko knew that she'd never be able to be a proper Pretty Cure and fight them off in her state of mind. In fact, she was convinced all she'd do is destroy everything and put people's lives in jeopardy, and she knew Marina would yell at her about it and make it sound like she did it on purpose. She thanked God for at least not making them fight any Corrupt Sentinels this weekend.

But still, the guilt that was gnawing at her heart made her want to scream and throw a tantrum. She wanted to get it all out and over with, but she couldn't, because screaming and throwing tantrums isn't appropriate. That's what everyone always told her. But she did make up for it by grunting, spinning sometimes, flapping her hands rapidly, and stamping her foot a couple times. Sunbeam, who was still reading, didn't say anything.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Monday's sunshine finally brightened up the world with it's golden effulgence. The laughter of the children on the blacktop made the air around them quite lively. After Saki dropped her off, Riko looked all over the blacktop for the red haired boy. Finally, she found him. "Kyo-chan! I just want to-"

"I'm sorry, Riko," Kyoya interjected, his calm face morphing into that of an apologetic one, his emerald eyes filled to the brim with remorse. "I should never have called you an idiot, and I'm sorry I took what you said the wrong way."

Riko shook her head. "I'm the one who should be saying sorry. I said something I shouldn't have. But I swear to God, I never ever meant anything bad by it! Honest! I never meant to hurt your feelings or make you think I'm friends with you because I think you're weak and helpless, which I KNOW you're not! You're absolutely more than welcome to hate me and decide you don't want to be my friend anymore! I deserve it for being the idiot I am!" Riko exclaimed. Already she could feel the weight of guilt being lifted off of her.

"Riko. I don't hate you, I still want us to be friends, and you're not an idiot. I should have been more understanding. I'm sorry for thinking you were pitying me," Kyoya told her kindly.

Riko tilted her head to one side. "What does pity mean?"

"You seriously don't know what pity is?" Marina asked, flummoxed by the fact that Riko doesn't know what that word means.

"No. Am I supposed to?" Riko asked back.

Kyoya's eyes were as wide as saucers, and he couldn't prevent the ungraceful dropping of his jaw. _'God, I thought she pitied me yet she actually doesn't know what the word even means?! Wow, Saki-san was right!'_ Before he could stop himself, he found himself bursting into merry laughter which helped shed the guilt off of him.

"What did I do this time?" Riko asked, feeling a bit offended by his laughing, even though he wasn't laughing at her.

"Sorry. When you pity someone, you feel sorry for them and think you have to protect them and feel like they can't do anything on their own," Kyoya explained after calming down.

"Ohhhh. Well, I _don't_ pity you. You're strong and brave and can do lots of things! I'm the one who's weak and helpless and stupid," Riko said, feeling better upon understanding everything a little better. A warm, happy glow began to curl into her heart and make her eyes sparkle, pushing the sadness away. She had to wonder if this is what it's like to get into fights with friends and make up again. Kyoya could tell he was forgiven, though Saki was right in that she acted a little bit paranoid. He had to wonder if Riko doesn't feel like she deserves forgiveness for anything. "I did try to call you yesterday but you didn't answer."

"Sorry. I go to the hospital on weekends for physical therapy. That's why," Kyoya replied. The bell's loud ringing resounded in the air as he finished.

"We better get to class," Kyoya said with his usual congenial smile as he held his hand out to Riko. To Riko, this was a sure sign that she is officially forgiven.

"Yeah," Riko replied sweetly as she put her own hand in his as they walked into Hikaribashi Middle School's building together.

But what the two of them don't know was that Fukiko saw them make up. The girl kneaded one of her tank top straps with her spindly fingers as she tried to get into the school building, with her hazel eyes looking very wistful, like she really wanted to talk to them but couldn't.


	11. Sunbeam Isn't Very Sunny Today

Chapter 11: Sunbeam Isn't Very Sunny In This Sunshine!

Sniveling. Sobbing. It was the second time she heard it, and her room was still blue with the Tuesday sunshine trying to wake up and get ready to bring in the new day. Riko found herself awoken yet again by the familiar yet unsettling and heartbreaking sound of Sunbeam crying in her sleep. It was the second time she had to take care of her, and the fluffy little orange and yellow fairy still hadn't recovered from that awful day. Riko turned around in her bed to find Sunbeam sleeping next to her, with dark droplet marks on the pillow underneath her.

"Zenjin...stupid stupid stupid! I...hate you!" Sunbeam mumbled in her sleep, trying to bury her head in the pillow Riko put out for her.

"Sunbeam…" Riko whispered softly. She took her finger and poked her with it. When that didn't work, she shook her with it gently. "Sunbeam. Wake up."

Sunbeam stopped stirring, and she turned to look at the weary but concerned and worried Riko, her eyes wet and puffy from too much tears. Riko's heart sank the minute she saw that sad face again. It was bad enough watching her cry the first time. Then again, considering how cruel Zenjin was toward her, she wasn't surprised. It did nothing to make her stop worrying.

"Are you having a nightmare?" Riko asked. Sunbeam sat up, rubbed her puffy eyes, and nodded. Riko sat up and looked at the clock on her bureau. The clock read 6:11 AM. Riko scooped little Sunbeam in her long arms despite them being covered by her cotton candy pink pajamas with white flowers on them. "Want to have some early morning fun with me?"

"Sure," Sunbeam muttered tearfully. Very silently, Riko and Sunbeam walked out of her bedroom, trotted down the stairs as quietly as they could manage, and walked all the way into the den. Riko pulled the shades on one of the windows back, revealing the wide back yard behind it. Riko held little Sunbeam up to look out the window.

"Doesn't look like there's any deer out back," Riko muttered.

"What deer?"

Riko smiled. "Sometimes we see deer walk across our back yard. I've kinda gotten into the habit of checking whenever I have the chance."

Sunbeam's eyes adopted a glimmer of curiosity. "I see. Back in Rozaniela, my sisters and I would see alicorns sometimes, and we'd sneak out of the house to look for them."

"What are alicorns?"

"They're unicorns with wings. Or pegasi with horns."

"Like in _My Little Pony_? Lucky. I wish I could meet a real alicorn."

Sunbeam told Riko all about the alicorns: their pristine, snow white fur, their beautifully flowing, rainbow colored manes and tails that sparkle in the morning sunlight, their beautiful, willowy, feathered white wings, their long, sharp, pearl-like horns that look like they can pierce right through a whole mountain, their sterling silver hooves, the graceful way they fly through the rainbow covered skies and walk in the flower fields when they want to eat, the way their whole bodies sparkle like stars during the full moon when near lakes, and the potency of their magic.

Alicorns could do a lot more than Sunbeam and her sisters can, and they're said to be descended from the ancestors that created them. They can't shape shift, but when waving their long horns, they can create things with their magic, fix broken items, move things around, help people see into the future or the past, turn barren lands into a beautiful ocean of newborn flowers and wildlife (which basically means revive dead plants and flowers, allowing wildlife to re-inhabit the once barren area), and even shoot beams of light at their enemies when threatened. They're docile and timid creatures who prefer to avoid conflict, but they're not afraid to put their hooves down when needed, especially when their young are threatened. But if someone is unfailingly kind to them, they'll be best friends for life. They're also exemplary parents who never abandon their young.

"Now I want to meet a real alicorn even more," Riko mused sweetly.

"If we ever want to visit Rozaniela some time, I'd love to take you," Sunbeam told her with a smile. But as soon as she finished, her bright smile was wiped off of her face, and she looked out the window with sad, blue eyes.

"What's wrong?" Riko asked.

"Rozaniela...I wonder how everyone on there is doing. Mom and Dad...the Queen and King...our classmates and the creatures that live in the forests...I really want to go and see them and make sure they're all okay…" Sunbeam muttered sadly, her small voice trembling like she wanted to cry again. Riko could tell Sunbeam was getting homesick. She couldn't blame her.

"Why can't you go? Do you not know how?" Riko asked again, both concerned and curious at the same time.

"We actually do. It's in a dimension different from this planet, but...lately we haven't been able to rip it open and just go there. We don't even have a way to communicate with them, like walkie talkies or cell phones. Well, we do have one way, but we can't make it connect to Rozaniela for some reason," Sunbeam explained sadly.

"A different dimension? Really?" Riko asked, her eyes wide from the new revelation. Alternate dimensions exist?

Sunbeam nodded. "Our ancestors chose to hide Rozaniela in another dimension so the people on Earth won't find us and think we're trying to hurt them. But we Rozanielans can go back and forth when we want to. We try to be quiet about it so we don't scare people or freak them out."

"I totally get it. There's lots of stories about aliens being written as monsters who eat people or dissect them. I don't think that's entirely true, but they're all science fiction stuff," Riko piped in. "I wonder if maybe you can't open the dimension because your friends on your planet are trying to get back on their feet."

"That's possible. Zenjin did a big number on it. I think a lot of people and creatures died," Sunbeam said, and then sighed. "I miss Mom and Dad. I really hope they haven't...and the alicorns…"

Riko could tell what Sunbeam was worried about. Her heart went out to the orange fairy. Sunbeam was still a child, and yet she and her sisters have endured so much tragedy in a very short amount of time. They probably haven't had the time to really cope with what happened. First their home is decimated, then they're in a new planet that's completely different from their own for their own safety and to find the Pretty Cures, and then Sunbeam's heart gets cruelly and mercilessly stomped on, ripped to pieces, and left to be carried off by the wind by someone she wanted to help, who turns out to be the person who caused this entire mess in the first place. Worst of all, she doesn't know if her parents and friends are alive or not, made worse by the fact that she and her sisters have absolutely no possible way of finding out. Perhaps there was more to Sunbeam's nightmares than she expected.

If Riko had to go through all of that, she'd be so sad she want to hide somewhere forever. She had to wonder how Sunbeam was still able to go on after all that she and her sisters went through, especially since she went through the worst of it because of her failed attempts to befriend Zenjin. Riko wished she could reassure Sunbeam and tell her everything will be alright. But she doesn't know what happened to her parents. Nobody does, and she didn't want to tell her something and then find the outcome to turn out to be the opposite. Sunbeam's been through enough heartbreak. She didn't want to unknowingly cause any more of it.

"Riko-chan?"

"Hm?"

"Have you lived in Hikaribashi your whole life?"

'_What brought that on?'_ Riko thought. But she didn't want to be rude, so she simply answered Sunbeam's question. "No. I used to live somewhere else."

"Really?"

"Yep. Yokosuka. That's in the Kanagawa Prefecture, and that's somewhere in Tokyo. We moved here about a month ago."

"Do you miss it?"

"Honestly...no," Riko replied.

"Huh? But you've lived in Yokosuka your whole life! You really don't miss it at all?"

Riko isn't sure what brought that on either, but she continued on like usual. "No. I don't. I don't even miss my old house. This one is much bigger and nicer. Plus, there's too many bad memories over there. I'm much happier here than I ever was at Yokosuka. I have real, non-imaginary friends, for one thing. Kyo-chan, An-chan, Mari-chan, Hotaru-chan, Moonbeam, Starbeam, and even you, Sunbeam."

'_Wow. She's really honest, isn't she? Kinda like me. She's the first person I've ever met who's happy to be away from everything that was once familiar to her,'_ Sunbeam thought, awestruck by how Riko said all of that without sounding sad or hesitant. Normally when people are in a completely new environment, far away from everything they know and love, they tend to be homesick. Even the bravest of people who manage to adjust well get a little bit homesick. Riko hadn't shown any of that. But then again, Sunbeam and her sisters did all fall into Hikaribashi on their rather rough first day on Earth, so it was natural she'd assume Riko lived here her whole life.

But Riko said there were too many bad memories at Yokosuka. What did she mean by that? Upon further rumination, after Zenjin broke her heart, Riko told her that people were really mean to her just because she was different from them and didn't understand her, nor did they want to or care to. Sunbeam wanted to ask, but her head was throbbing, prompting her to put her questions in a box in the confines of her mind.

"I think I'll go back to bed now. I really like talking to you," Sunbeam said, scratching one of her ears with her stubby little hand.

"Thanks. I think Oniichan's gonna wake up soon, so that'd be a good idea," Riko replied sweetly as she scooped Sunbeam into her loving arms, ambled back into her room, and gently tucked Sunbeam back into bed like a mother does with her child.

* * *

"What's a supernova?" Moonbeam asked curiously as she read an excerpt from one of Hotaru's old, shabby, metal bound notebooks with lots of star drawings and scribbles dabbling them.

Hotaru sat on her bed, looking up at the plastic, glow in the dark stars of varying sizes and shapes dotting her whole entire room, glowing in a variety of colors. Moonbeam was on Hotaru's desk reading her notebook with a little blue flashlight while Hotaru, draped in pale yellow, long sleeved pajamas with white stars on them in varying sizes and shapes, was lying on her bed reading Edogawa Rampo's _The Fiend With Twenty Faces_(1). The pillow her raven haired head was lying on was midnight blue, with Saturn, Jupiter, and a myriad of little white stars keeping them company, and the comforter she was lying on was dark blue with a snow white crescent moon on it and lots of white stars dotting it.

"A supernova is when a very big star explodes. It happens when a star runs out of energy to make heat and light, so it collapses and then explodes. But there haven't been any supernovas in years. In fact, the last supernova to ever appear in our own galaxy, the Milky Way, happened in the year 1604, almost 500 years ago," Hotaru explained kindly, as she was too focused on whether the boy detective, Kobayashi Yoshio, will escape Twenty Faces' evil clutches.

"Are planets considered stars?" Moonbeam asked as Hotaru turned the page.

"No. Planets aren't stars. But the sun is a star. In fact, the sun is the only star that's close to Earth. All other stars are far away, so far that they only look like little sparkling dots," Hotaru said as she turned the page again, right as Yoshio decided to send his faithful pigeon friend out to get help.

"You really like stars, don't you?" Moonbeam asked as she looked through more of Hotaru's old notes. But then she instantly regretted asking since Hotaru's liking for stars was pretty obvious.

Hotaru had glow in the dark plastic stars glued to every single wall in her room. She had star themed bedding. She was wearing star themed pajamas. She had lots of books on astronomy, stars, moons, planets, the universe, etc. One of her lamps had a star themed lamp shade, also blue, yellow, and white. She even had a few multicolored plushies of the star shaped Lumas from Super Mario Galaxy.

"I do. I want to be an astronomer when I grow up. It's just so fascinating to study stars, how they're formed, how they die, and how people interpret them," Hotaru said, turning the page once more.

"Is that why you named your Pretty Cure form Cure Starlight?" Moonbeam asked as she looked through more of Hotaru's old notes, some of which are about nebulas this time.

"Yes. I was originally going to name myself Cure Constellation, but that sounded a bit too long. Plus, Starlight sounds more elegant, beautiful, and mysterious," Hotaru told her kindly as she put a _Fruits Basket_(2) themed bookmark in Twenty Faces, closed the book shut, and placed it next to her on her bed.

"I agree. It suits you much better," Moonbeam replied. "My parents named me and all of my sisters words with the word beam in it, because they want us all to be strong and radiant, like beams of light."

"That sounds nice," Hotaru said. But Moonbeam didn't say anything after that. The little pale purple bunny's long, straight ears suddenly drooped downward. Hotaru stood up from the bed and walked over to the sad, purple bunny as she took a piece of her raven black hair out of her mouth. "What's the matter, Moonbeam?"

"Mom...Dad...Queen...I really hope they're okay...I miss them…" Moonbeam's voice trembled and her silver eyes watered, like she wanted to cry. Hotaru's heart went out to the sad bunny.

"I'm sure you do. But they say no news is good news, right?" Hotaru said, trying to reassure the little bunny, but in her heart, she could tell it sounded forced.

"I know. I want to believe they're still alive and well. The Queen wasn't dead when she sent us out to Earth to find you Pretty Cure, so...who knows. But...Sunbeam's been through the worst out of all of us," Moonbeam told her quietly, suppressing the urge to cry.

"It's because of Zenjin, isn't it?" Hotaru said. The memory of that day was strong in her mind.

A tear trickled out of Moonbeam's left eye, but she made sure not to let it fall on Hotaru's notes. She didn't want to damage the notes she so lovingly and painstakingly scribbled into the slightly torn and worn notebook papers, with their half crumpled, half tattered edges. "Yes. Sunbeam used to be so cheerful and bright, like the sun. She always faced every situation with a smile and lots of vigor, no matter how hopeless it seemed. But...she truly believed she could help Zenjin and be his friend. No, more than that, she truly believed she really was friends with him. I...I know I'm a pacifist, and I don't like being angry at people or fighting, but Zenjin went way too far!" Moonbeam said softly at first, then grunted as she voiced her frustrations regarding that silver haired knave who ruined their beloved planet with his insatiable lust for power. "He should never have broke Sunbeam's heart like that! If he really hated Sunbeam from the start, he should have just said so instead of tricking her all these years, that way she wouldn't have taken it so hard! Granted, he never talked to her when they interacted, so nobody knew what he was thinking. And how can he be so ungrateful?! Our friends saved him and gave him everything he never got on Earth! Sunbeam did everything for him, and he had to nerve to say all those mean things to her! I honestly want to deck him! Sunbeam doesn't deserve to have her heart get stomped on like that! It's his fault that Sunbeam's done nothing but be sad, sad, sad! She hardly ever smiles anymore!" Moonbeam yelled as she stamped her stubby little purple foot on Hotaru's desk.

"I agree. I'm actually taking a psychology class in school right now, and...now that I think about it, how old was Zenjin when your friends rescued him?" Hotaru pondered out loud.

"He was ten, but he was so skinny and spindly and starved-looking and battered that he looked a lot younger," Moonbeam explained, wiping some tears away from her purple face. "Why?"

"My teacher recently explained that if a child gets abused at an early age and doesn't get rescued early enough in life, their brain growth becomes extremely stunted, and the damage to their psyche can be so strong, so profound, and so complete that the scars in their hearts and souls can never be healed, even if they eventually receive any kind of love and affection at all if they're rescued late enough," Hotaru explained.

Moonbeam's ears drooped again. "The Queen and everyone else mostly rescued babies from dirty and neglectful orphanages from third world countries from your world. They were the easiest to rescue because nobody who had them would care if they got taken. Zenjin was one of the first kids the King and his disciples ever rescued who was both not a baby, not an orphan, and from an abusive home where that evil woman would actually notice he was gone. Maybe...if they had saved him early enough...or maybe if they had noticed early enough...none of this would have happened. Zenjin wouldn't have turned evil, and Sunbeam wouldn't be so sad and heartbroken…" Moonbeam explained despondently.

"It's not like you knew any of this was coming, so don't blame yourself, little one," Hotaru told her gently as she stroke one of Moonbeam's long, soft, plum purple ears.

"I know. But it just breaks my heart to see Sunbeam so sad all the time now, and I really really want to know if Mom and Dad are safe. I'm dying to know if they are or not!" Moonbeam replied, her sterling silver eyes weary with both early wakefulness and worry. "Speaking of parents...I hope you don't find me asking this rude, but how come you have two dads?"

Hotaru wasted no time answering. "I get asked that a lot, but to be honest, I don't really know why. That's just how it's always been," Hotaru replied with a smile, unoffended by Moonbeam's innocent well-intentioned question.

"But don't you have a mom? Everyone has a mom. Men can't give birth like women can. Were you adopted?" Moonbeam asked.

Now that Moonbeam brought it up, Hotaru began ruminating. Is she adopted or not? She had been raised by her two homosexual fathers her whole life, and although she used to be angry at the thought of not having a mother like the other kids, she never asked about who her mother was. Sojiro and Kyouichi love her very much, and to Hotaru, that was all that mattered. But Moonbeam did beg a good question.

"I'm afraid I don't know," Hotaru replied. "But I'll ask one of my dads sometime."

"Sorry. Did I ask something bad?" Moonbeam asked, starting to regret asking Hotaru about her parental lineage.

"Oh no, not at all. I'm glad you asked. I never did ask about who my mother was, so I'll ask them sometime."

"I see."

"What do your parents do?"

"Huh?"

"Do they have jobs on your planet?"

"Oh, yes! My dad, Hornbeam, is a doctor and he's always going around helping people and fairies and aliens alike. He makes his own medicine out of tree leaves and plants, too. In fact, he's our king's family doctor, and usually gets called in whenever he gets sick or when babies that we saved need immediate medical attention. My mom, Crossbeam, is an architect. She makes plans for new buildings and oversees their construction. Knowing Dad, he might be running around helping people and saving them with his medical skills, and Mom might be designing new buildings to make now that the other ones are destroyed. I really hope that's what they're doing…"

"Well, for now, let's stay positive. If you're sad all the time, your judgment gets clouded."

"Okay. But...Sunbeam's been sad all the time now. I think I'll go check on her later."

"I think she'd like that."

* * *

When the sun finally began to peek over the horizon and wake the world up, Moonbeam decided to go ask Starbeam and Lovebeam if they wanted to hang out at Riko's house and check on Sunbeam. While Lovebeam certainly wasn't happy to be awoken from her beauty sleep, she agreed and went with them, even though it took her a while to rub the sleep out of her eyes.

"Exactly what happened to Sunbeam while I was gone anyway?" Lovebeam grumbled as she continued to rub her eyes while following Starbeam.

"Oh! We haven't told you, have we?" Starbeam exclaimed upon realizing that neither she nor Moonbeam have told Lovebeam about what happened between Sunbeam and Zenjin. Granted, Lovebeam was still wandering around lost at that time, and they haven't been able to find her then, so perhaps it was to be expected. They told Lovebeam everything as they flew through the neighborhood, getting closer to Riko's house and the scenery around them began to brighten.

"Oh! We have arrived," Starbeam said once they finished relaying the story to her. Moonbeam, Starbeam, and Lovebeam floated up to a window that led to Riko's room, opened it (it was unlocked), and flew right in. It didn't take too long for them to find Sunbeam lying in Riko's bed, covered with what appears to be a white baby blanket.

"Rise and shine, sleepyhead!" Moonbeam chirped cheerfully, hoping to perk her up a bit. But they stopped when they noticed something odd. Sunbeam's face is unusually flushed and a splotchy red color. Some sweat trickled down her face and into the pillow her orange and yellow head is lying on. Her breathing, while subdued, was rather hoarse and labored. Starbeam descended next to her and put a hand on her forehead. She was hotter than a roasted marshmallow.

"Oh my! You have a fever!" Starbeam yelped.

"She's sick?" Lovebeam asked, confused.

"Wow. I sure am glad I suggested we visit her today!" Moonbeam piped in, immediately worried sick for her ill sister. It was here that Riko came back into the room, dressed in a pale purple shirt underneath a sleeveless white hoodie with a purple cat sewn on the big pocket on the abdomen, long brown pants, and white sneakers. In her hand was a white bottle cap with water in it. Moonbeam could see from Riko's forlorn, contorted face that she was also sick with worry.

"Oh. Hi girls," Riko said as she walked over to Sunbeam. "Sunbeam. I have some more water. You have to drink some."

Wearily, Sunbeam opened her blue eyes-which were completely lacking in her usual sparkle and cheeriness-sat up, took the white bottle cap, and gulped down all the water in one go. She put it back down and snuggled back underneath Riko's baby blanket.

"How long has she been like this?" Starbeam asked Riko with concern.

"Just for the past fifteen minutes. All I've managed to do is give her lots of water," Riko said as she looked at her clock, which read 7:18 AM. "I want to stay and take care of her, but I have to go to school today, and I'd much rather not go!" Inoue Yoshie came to her mind. She really didn't want to put up with her and lots of boring lessons today. At least taking care of Sunbeam, sick as she was, would be far more pleasant than dealing with school.

"It's okay, Riko-chan. We can stay and take care of her while you're away," Lovebeam told her in a soft, kind voice, which flummoxed Riko a bit. She had never heard Lovebeam talk in that kind of tone before. She actually wasn't complaining or acting like a brat today. Perhaps she knew this wasn't the time for that kind of behavior.

"It was my idea to have us all come visit, and I sure am glad I suggested it," Moonbeam piped in.

"Thanks, little ones. I really appreciate this. Really, I'd much rather stay here than go to school," Riko told them gratefully.

"Our first priority is to bring Sunbeam's fever down, but I'm afraid there isn't a cloth around here that is of a reasonable size we can put on her forehead," Starbeam explained worriedly.

"Oh! I have something that's just the right size!" Riko exclaimed, her eyes wide and bright, as she ran to her bureau, grabbed something out of the box she keeps her video games in, and showed it to the fairies. It's a tiny little black cloth with the word _Nintendo DS_ written on it in white.

"What's this?"

"It's the microfiber cloth used to clean my Nintendo DS! Be right back!" Riko explained before dashing into the bathroom, turning on the faucet, and letting the water soak the microfiber cloth. Once it was wet enough, she turned off the faucet, folded the microfiber cloth into a rectangle shape, walked back into the bedroom, and very gently placed it on Sunbeam's head. "There!"

"That solves one problem. Thanks," Moonbeam told her gratefully.

"You're welcome," Riko replied sheepishly.

"I...I'm...fine…" Riko and the fairies turned around when they heard a mumbling noise, which came right out of Sunbeam's mouth. Her dull blue eyes were wide open.

"You're awake, Sunbeam!" Moonbeam chirped happily.

"I'm fine. You don't need to...fawn over me…" Sunbeam mumbled as she tried to sit up, but the minute she did, she erupted into a harsh coughing fit. Riko's soaking wet microfiber cloth fell off of Sunbeam's forehead the minute she started to cough. Starbeam gingerly pushed Sunbeam back underneath Riko's baby blanket.

"You mustn't strain yourself. It seems you have contracted a rather nasty cold. We'll take care of you, Sunbeam. You need to rest and reaccumulate your strength. It won't do you any good to start moving around," Starbeam told her.

"You're not my nurse…" Sunbeam grunted but obeyed Starbeam's orders.

"I do think I have an idea of why Sunbeam's so sick," Starbeam said.

"Really? It isn't just some cold that comes out of nowhere?" Riko asked.

"It looks like it, but there's evidence that Sunbeam is sick because of a fierce combination of both stress and culture shock," Starbeam explained.

"Stress? Culture shock?" Riko asked, tilting her head.

"Riko! Breakfast is ready!" Arinao called out from downstairs.

"Coming!" Riko called back. She then turned to the fairies. "You have to stay in my room when my parents are here. There's lots of water down in the kitchen, and you can use the white bottle cap to give Sunbeam whatever water she needs. If you need to re-soak the cloth, use the bathroom sink up here to save you a trip. There's a bunch of little microwavable soups down in the kitchen in the long cupboards. The instructions are on the cup, but I haven't cooked them myself. Understand?"

"Okie dokie loki!" Lovebeam chirped while doing a sailor salute.

"Please rest assured, Riko-chan. We'll do whatever we can to rejuvenate Sunbeam's health. You'd best be off to school," Starbeam told her reassuringly. Riko waved to the fairies and dashed out the door.

When Riko got to school, she didn't waste any time tracking down Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina to tell them about what happened to Sunbeam.

"She's sick? Really?" Marina asked, confused, twirling one of the curls in her orange hair with her fingers.

"Yeah. Starbeam says Sunbeam's under a lot of stress, which might have caused her to get sick," Riko told her.

"Considering what we saw back then, I'm not surprised," Anzu said. "If I can get sick to the point of vomiting three times a month because of my parents' divorce, then it's not too uncommon to see people get sick from other stuff, like worrying about a test or moving to a new country or being abused or stuff like that."

Riko looked down at her sneakers, her dark emerald eyes donning a sad gleam. "I wish I could stay home and look after her. I'm sure her sisters will definitely take good care of her. That I don't doubt. But I really don't want to put up with Inoue and Kosaka today."

"I feel you," Kyoya piped in. "Wait, what happened to Sunbeam?"

"Oh! We didn't tell you, did we?" Riko yelped. She wasted no time telling him about what happened between Zenjin and Sunbeam.

"Jeez. Talk about hitting a girl where it hurts, especially after all that. I can kinda relate to her," Kyoya replied after the story of Sunbeam's woe was told to him.

"Huh? What do you mean?" Riko asked. Marina rolled her eyes and continued to twirl a curl in her hair with her fingers.

"Before the accident, I had a pretty decent circle of friends. But when I came back to school, they ditched me because they decided hanging out with a kid in a wheelchair would cramp their style," Kyoya told her like it was the most casual thing in the world.

"That's awful!" Riko exclaimed. "Who are these people?! Tell me their names so I can yell at them all day!"

As Kyoya and the girls went on about their conversation, they were oblivious to the fact that Fukiko was watching them yet again. Gripping one of her backpack straps tightly, she was about to walk toward them until someone called out to her.

"Hey, Fu-chan!" A girl's voice prompted Fukiko to stop and turn around to find a girl with short, chin-length, raven black hair behind her, along with two other girls, a plump and slightly overweight one with square-shaped glasses and curly black hair, and another one with shorter black hair in a flouncy ponytail with a yellow star hair clip in it.

"Hi, Ryoko-chan. What's up?" Fukiko asked her friend, Ryoko.

"I'm having a sleepover this weekend! Kazumi and Manaka here are gonna come," Ryoko exclaimed cheerfully, referring to the plump girl as Kazumi and the ponytail girl as Manaka. "I'd love it if you could come! We're gonna watch my new DVD of High School Musical! I just ADORE Zac Efron! And we're gonna play some Dance Dance Revolution and my brand new air hockey table!"

Fukiko sweatdropped a bit. "I'd love to go, but I can't. My grandparents are gonna visit."

"Awww, that's so not fair!" Kazumi complained.

"I know, right?" Manaka piped in.

"I see. That's okay. You can come next time. By the way, were you just about to hang out with the Loser League?" Ryoko asked.

"Loser League?" Fukiko asked, confused as to who they're talking about.

"Them! Scarface, Goth Girl, Four Eyes, and the weirdo!" Ryoko shouted, unabashedly pointing her finger at the oblivious group.

"It's not nice to call people names, Ryoko-chan," Fukiko said, finding their insistence on calling them degrading nicknames rather unsettling and rude.

"But you know it's true!" Ryoko retorted. "You're better off staying as far away from them as possible. They'll just make you look weird."

"True that. Plus I really don't get why Tasogare want to hang out with Scarface and Goth Girl. Scarface is a criminal's kid, and Goth Girl creeps me out. She dresses in black all the time!" Manaka replied. "And you know Scarface flips out at pretty much everyone for no reason."

"It runs in her family," Ryoko retorted.

"I don't see anything wrong with wearing black a lot, and just because someone's related to a criminal doesn't mean they'll become one," Fukiko piped in, giving them some disappointed looks.

"How do you know?" Ryoko asked, crossing her arms.

"You know the band Blue Moon, right? The one everybody says is making an epic comeback? Their lead singer had a dad who was a drug addict. She didn't become a criminal, now did she?" Fukiko replied as calmly as she could muster. Ryoko was so stumped by Fukiko's response that she couldn't come up with a counterargument. Later, the girls left, leaving Fukiko alone.

Fukiko made a contorted face at them, disgusted by their behavior. _'I can't believe I chose them over Kyoya. I really am stupid. Tasogare doesn't talk bad about people, and she's best friends with Chino and Asagi, and she doesn't care that Kyoya's in a wheelchair,'_ Fukiko thought to herself, with regret poking at her heart.

Fukiko watched Riko, Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina for a long time, and she was understandably surprised by how happy they always were during classes. Always chatting, laughing, sometimes squabbling, talking about their interests, doing things together, not caring about their eccentricities and deficiencies, etc. They really looked like the best of friends, even though they're so different from each other. They're never mean to each other, and never pick on each other for their personalities, deficiencies, and straying away from the norm. In fact, they seemed to be happy that they're not conforming to the popular opinion, and they certainly don't seem to be bothered by Kyoya's being in a wheelchair, like they don't even notice it. It was like he's not even in a wheelchair at all. Not only that, Marina and Anzu actually smiled around them, like they were having the time of their lives.

Fukiko wondered if she could ever have a circle of friends like that, instead of hanging around with the gossipy Ryoko, Kazumi, and Manaka. She gripped one of her backpack straps tightly again.

When the school bell finally rang, classes began, and everyone scrambled into the Hikaribashi Middle School building. Riko kept on worrying about Sunbeam's welfare, but she knew better than to let it completely consume her, especially when there are lessons to be done, so she made sure to pay attention and take as much notes as possible.

* * *

Back at the Tasogare house, Lovebeam is alone in Riko's room with Sunbeam, slowly dipping Riko's black microfiber cloth into a small plastic cup of water that Moonbeam made an hour ago. Once it was wet enough, Lovebeam folded it neatly into a rectangular shape and put it back onto Sunbeam's forehead.

"Hey Lovebeam?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you think the alicorns are okay? On Rozaniela?"

Lovebeam looked down at Riko's blanket with a despondent look. "I don't know. But the Queen says they're strong, so I don't think they'll go down easily."

"Yeah. You're right. They can be pretty fierce when threatened. I remember that one time you accidentally kicked dirt into one alicorn foal's eyes and it's mother tried to zap you with thunderbolts," Sunbeam chuckled upon telling that story.

"Don't remind me! That winged unicorn almost turned me into charred ribs!" Lovebeam pouted, crossing her little arms, feeling her face heat. "I didn't mean to kick sand into her kid's eyes! But yeah, that was pretty stupid of me, though."

Sunbeam giggled again, a sweet smile tickling her plump, burning face. But her giggling was pushed away by another coughing fit. "Ugh!"

"You okay?"

"I hate being sick."

"We all do. I wish Dad were here. He'd probably do a much better job at taking care of you than we can."

"Yeah, but I don't mind. You're doing just fine."

Soon, silence fell between them until Sunbeam spoke again. Lovebeam could see Sunbeam's dull blue eyes watering a bit. She couldn't tell if Sunbeam wanted to cry or if her coughing fit is making her eyes itch. "I'm so stupid," Sunbeam muttered.

"How so?"

"I was a fool to think...I could be friends with Zenjin. I...I really thought I could make him happy. But he never liked me at all. Maybe...if I had never talked to him, things might have turned out differently," Sunbeam murmured sadly. Some tears dropped onto her pillow.

"It's not your fault, Sunbeam. You didn't know. Nobody can tell what he's thinking. He spoke so little back then, so it's not surprising nobody could tell what he was thinking. Besides, it's not like you can read minds or anything," Lovebeam told her reassuringly.

"I know. But...if he really hated me from the start, he should have just said so...instead of being silent the whole time and playing me for a fool."

"You're not a fool. He's the fool around here. He should never have been so mean to you! If I had been there when he said those things to you, I'd have kicked his sorry butt!"

"Yeah, especially since you never trusted him from the beginning. Sorry I didn't listen to you."

"That's okay. I didn't really expect anyone to listen anyway. Plus, I didn't want to hurt your feelings since you wanted to be his friend and all. But ugh! I want to sock him so hard in the mouth it'd wake up his dentist!"

"He's kinda been socked in the mouth his whole life, considering what Mom, Dad, the Queen, and King know about him."

"Good point."

It was at this point that Sunbeam began to notice something very odd. For once, Lovebeam WASN'T acting like a complete spoiled brat. Usually all she did was complain, whine, yell, be demanding, and scream at anything and everything. She's actually acting like a good big sister, especially since she's technically the oldest. Not only that, Lovebeam's been spending the past few hours solely with Sunbeam, taking care of her. Nothing else. Not once did she complain, whine, yell, scream, be demanding, or leave everyone else to do everything and go off doing whatever she wanted to do. Lovebeam gave her water, soaking the black microfiber cloth and putting it on her head whenever it dried every so often, and pretty much stayed by her side for the entire morning.

In the downstairs kitchen, Moonbeam and Starbeam just finished taking a metal thing off of a bowl of microwavable soup. The two of them put the green cap on it before putting it in the microwave with the greatest amount of care possible. They didn't want to spill any of its contents. Moonbeam set the microwave to one minute and watched as the bowl of soup spun around. But Starbeam found herself walking down memory lane as she waited for the soup to be ready.

(flashback)

_Books, books, books. And what's this? Oh, look! More books! Large and small, thin and thick, all medical books with very complicated titles, like _Medical Physiology, Clinical Anatomy, Clinical Neuroanatomy, Medical and Health Care, The Brain Atlas, Herbal Remedies, Nutritional Healing_, etc. That was all that Starbeam saw the minute she opened the door to her father's dimly lit study. Books, both closed and opened, towered all around the study, some scattered on the floor with their pages lying right on the wild shag carpet rug. _

_Sitting on top of a small wooden desk was a fairy like herself, but slightly bigger, with pale green fur like limes, with a single mahogany stripe on both of its long, pointed ears, along with mahogany colored donut-shaped things wrapped around part of his ears a little below the points. The green fairy was wearing a teal colored neck tie with a white stripe at a right angle and a black top hat with a yellow stripe wrapped around it. Starbeam very quietly floated toward the desk and saw that the green fairy has a white bowl in front of him, with a white primitive masher that's being used to crush what appears to be dark green leaves._

"_Are you making medicine, Father?" Starbeam asked as she sat on the other side of the bowl as her father continued to mash the leaves with the masher._

"_Hello there, Starbeam. Yes, I am. Decebal says Zenjin's sick from culture shock, and I've got the perfect remedy for it right here. I just need to crush it some more and mix it with some cold water," Starbeam's father said without stopping what he's doing._

"_Humans can get sick from coming to a new planet?" Starbeam asked, curious, tilting her head to one side slightly._

"_Some of them, yes. Zenjin's going through the worst part of the second stage of culture shock, called the _'Negotiation Stage,'_ as the humans call it," Starbeam's father explained. "Decebal says the kid is throwing tantrums, breaking things, and is angry all the time, refusing food and not taking proper care of himself. It's hard for a child his age and background to suddenly have to adapt to being in a completely new place far away from everything he knows, especially since he's the first fully grown kid we've saved in decades. Now he's got a fever and needs this medicine. This is called the Relaxation Plant. This is often used for people who've pushed themselves too hard to the point where their bodies are exhausted and still anxious to do more, like the kid. This helps lessen the tension in their muscles and relieves the stress on their bodies."_

"_You certainly have an infinite amount of knowledge swirling around in that cranium of yours. How come you're able to house it and not forget any of it?" Starbeam asked with a smile, impressed._

"_I don't know. That's just how it's always been for me. Plus, to be a doctor, there's a lot you have to keep in your head. It's not easy, but the more knowledge you have, the better you'll be able to identify certain things and solve problems during a crisis. There! Can you get me a bottle of cold water please?" Starbeam's father explained as he finished mashing the green leaves._

"_Yes, Father!" Starbeam chirped excitedly and floated to the very pristine and well kept kitchen to grab a very small bottle of water-smaller than the smallest bottles of water people from the human world make. When Starbeam got it and undid the cap, she floated back to her father's study. The green fairy with the top hat smiled as Starbeam handed him the bottle._

"_Thanks so much, Starry. You're a big help," The green fairy told his faithful daughter gratefully and gave her a good hug before pouring some water into the bowl. Soon, the water turned a rather unsightly green color._

"_My, it doesn't look very delicious," Starbeam said as she watched the water morph into the ghastly green color._

"_It may look horrible, but it actually tastes pretty good, like fresh grapes. It's complete!" Starbeam's father said as he went into a drawer in his desk to pull out a very small, wooden thermos. Starbeam took the thermos and opened it while her father slowly poured the handmade medicine into it. "Thanks, Starbeam. Here's some leaves for you," Her father said as he grabbed some extra leaves and handed them to a confused Starbeam._

"_Why these?" Starbeam asked curiously._

"_There may come a time when these may come in handy, and as you just saw, the medicine is very easy to make, so I don't see anything wrong with carrying these around. The little clip on your bow is a good place for them since they're made for carrying stuff without dragging around, y'know?" Starbeam's father explained sheepishly, his green cheeks donning a sweet rouge color. Starbeam smiled and took the leaves. They glowed in a blue light and it retreated into the yellow star clip on her pale green bow._

"_Thank you very much, Father," Starbeam told him gratefully._

"_Hornbeam! Get your nose out of those dusty old books!" A young woman's voice called out from the other room._

"_I'll be out in just a second, Crossbeam!" Starbeam's father, Hornbeam, called out. With smiles on both of their faces, father and daughter floated out of the book filled room to see what was up._

(end flashback)

Once the soup was ready, Starbeam and Moonbeam both carried it upstairs as slowly as they could, taking great care not to spill it. Once they put it on Riko's glass computer desk, Moonbeam flew back into the kitchen to grab a wad of paper towels and a few spoons.

Starbeam flew back into the kitchen to find a small glass bowl and a wooden masher that was in one of the drawers next to the stove. She flew into the basement and pulled the leaves Hornbeam gave her out of the star shaped clip on her ribbon. She put the leaves in the glass bowl and began mashing them with the wooden masher. If her memory served her right, she needed to mash the leaves into powder and then pour a small dose of cold water to make the crushed leaves mix with it to turn the water green.

Starbeam mashed and mashed the leaves as much as she could muster. Hornbeam didn't give her lessons on how to do it, nor did he specify how long it needed to take, but she watched him that one time, and he seemed to have no trouble, so she had to take a chance. If she didn't, how could she learn from it later on? Finally, the grinded leaves looked good enough to mix with water. Starbeam took the bowl and floated into the kitchen, put the bowl in the empty sink, turned on the faucet, and let the small trickle of water build into the bowl. Already she could see the water turning green upon contact.

She turned off the faucet, pulled out a glass spoon, and stirred it slightly in case stirring was needed. She grabbed another white bottle cap that was laying on the counter, dipped it in the medicine, and floated back to Riko's room, where Sunbeam, Moonbeam, and Starbeam are sitting on the wooden floor, all eating soup with their own spoons.

"Sunbeam. I made some medicine for you," Starbeam said as she showed Sunbeam the bottle cap full of green liquid.

"Ew. Looks gross," Sunbeam said, her face contorting with slight disgust at the ghastly color of the liquid.

"It looks gross, but it actually tastes good. Try it," Starbeam inquired gently.

"Oh well. Guess I must," Sunbeam reluctantly took the bottle cap and gulped down the liquid. Surprisingly, Starbeam was right. "Hey! It tastes like grapes!"

"Father made that medicine. He says it's good for rejuvenating people's energy, especially for people who are undergoing culture shock or collapsing from exhaustion," Starbeam told her, happy that the medicine came out good.

"It's a good thing he gave you those leaves," Moonbeam piped in as she ate a small carrot.

"Anyone want to play Go Fish after this? There's still a few more hours before Riko comes home," Lovebeam asked.

"Sure. That game doesn't require any arduous effort nor does it exhaust a substantial amount of bodily energy, so I suppose it's alright for Sunbeam to play," Starbeam said.

"There she goes with her big words again," Sunbeam snarked, making Lovebeam chuckle a bit.

"We'll just play one game, okay? I don't want you getting sick again," Moonbeam piped in.

"It's alright. I'm feeling a lot better now than I was this morning thanks to you girls," Sunbeam retorted with a smile, even though she had to admit Moonbeam did have a good point. But she felt much better now than this morning, when she was wheezing, coughing, and couldn't get out of bed. Her throat felt a lot less scratchy, her body didn't feel tighter than a bunch of ropes being pulled to their limit, and her head wasn't throbbing as much.

It felt nice to spend some time with her sisters.

* * *

Riko sat on the blacktop with her back against the chain link fence, contentedly reading a copy of Hinata Sun Child. She was lost in her manga until a slight yelp pulled her out of her book. "Agh!" She looked up to find Fukiko, struggling to get a piece of her skirt off of a small protrusion in the fence. Riko put her book away and stepped in to help. She very gently pulled the edge of Fukiko's skirt off the protrusion. She managed to make sure it didn't rip.

"Oh! Thank you!" Fukiko exclaimed gratefully.

"You're welcome," Riko replied with a smile.

Fukiko pushed some of her hair out of her face. "You're Tasogare, right? We have some classes together."

"Yeah, I am," Riko said. "Umm...this may be rude of me to ask, but...you used to be friends with Kyoya, right?"

"Uh…" Fukiko found herself speechless, not just because of Riko's question, but the fact that she asked it like it was the most casual question in the world. "Yeah, I used to."

"How come you're not friends anymore?"

"Well…" Fukiko found this to be the moment of truth. Riko seemed nice. She did help her out just now, so perhaps she might want to listen. "We were best friends once. But...after the accident, I…" Her voice began to tremble, and she was close to crying. "I...I haven't been very nice to him."

"How so?"

"I've been a terrible friend. All I've done in the past year is ignore him and hang out with the popular girls. See that boy over there?" Fukiko pointed to a black haired kid hanging out with his friends. "He's Funaki Daizo. He and Kyoya used to be best buds. But when Kyoya came back, Daizo completely ditched him because of his being in a wheelchair…" This was when the tears started to flow. "...and...and...I went along with him."

"Is being in a wheelchair really that big of a deal?" Riko asked casually. Fukiko became dumbfounded. "I mean, he was in an accident. It doesn't mean he's any different from when his legs were okay, and not all people in wheelchairs have brain damage. Kyo-chan's brain is working fine. He can still talk and crack jokes and do stuff other kids can."

Fukiko froze. She had a good point. A really good point. Memories began coming back to her mind. Kyoya presenting a project for school, talking about floods and the effects they have on both people, crops, and towns. Kyoya hanging out with Riko, Anzu, and Marina, happily chatting and cracking jokes. Even before that, Kyoya sticking up for himself when Marina slapped him alongside the head or tried to land some punches on him. Kyoya back talking Yuji when he called him an idiot and managed to completely turn the tables on him when things almost got ugly. _'She's right. She's so right. What have I been thinking all this time?!'_ Fukiko thought sadly until another memory came back to her.

(flashback)

"_I'm home," Fukiko walked into her house one day, looking and feeling dead tired until she looked up and found both of her parents standing in the living room, with their arms crossed, donning stern faces. Fukiko put her green backpack down, but continued to stand where she was._

"_Uhh...why do you two look so mad?" Fukiko asked, flummoxed by how austere they look. A lurching feeling in her gut told her it wasn't going to be pretty, and she was going to have to fess up about something. It's too late to run away from it now._

"_Fukiko. We need to talk," Fukiko's mother, a woman with chin length brown hair told her calmly, but sternly._

"_Did I do something wrong?" Fukiko asked._

"_Kyoya's mother called. She says you, Daizo, and the others stopped hanging out with him and now completely shun him from everything like he has some kind of disease...and apparently this all started after he came back to school. Care to explain yourself, Fukiko?" Fukiko's father, a small, lanky man with black hair and square shaped glasses asked sternly but calmly._

_Fukiko froze even further. They know! They know that she doesn't like Kyoya anymore! But what could she say to them? They're going to get mad at her no matter what she says, especially since Kayoko told them about what's been going on over the phone. How did Kayoko even know, anyway? Did Kyoya tell her? That was probably the most likely case._

"_Fukiko. Be honest with us. Do you not like Kyoya-kun anymore because he's in a wheelchair?" Her father asked calmly, sounding less strict this time._

_Fukiko gripped her skirt and bit her lip. But her silence pretty much gave her mother the answer she needed. "Fukiko! I thought I raised you better than this!"_

"_But Mom! He's different now!" Fukiko finally snapped, unable to remain silent anymore. "He used to be cool! Now he's all crippled!"_

"_Dounowaki Fukiko! Don't ever use that vulgar language in front of me!" Fukiko's mother shouted, wagging her finger at her frightened daughter, her small eyes looking like they want to pop right out of her face. Fukiko took a few steps back frightfully._

"_Honey, please. Calm down," Fukiko's father placed a gentle hand on his wife's shoulder, managing to pacify her and keep her from doing anything crazy. Reluctantly, Fukiko's mother calmed down. He then turned to face Fukiko. "Fukiko. Kyoya's your friend, isn't he? True friends don't abandon each other, especially when a friend's been in an accident and has to use a wheelchair for a while. Just because he's in one doesn't mean he's sick or brain damaged. Why is that a reason to not be his friend anymore?"_

"_I...I…" Fukiko was speechless. She couldn't get any words to come out. She couldn't contradict them._

"_We've told you to never judge people by what's on the outside. It's what's on the inside that counts. It doesn't matter if a person's disabled or not. They're still people, just like us, and they can still do things that we can," Fukiko's father told her after kneeling down to her level._

"_But...all the other kids say he's weird now. They say if I hang out with them, I won't be popular," Fukiko muttered sheepishly._

"_You care way more about being popular than being a good person?! Ugh! This is what's wrong with you! You're always being a shallow conformist giving in to peer pressure because you think it'll make people like you! That's not a good way to live, Fukiko!" Her mother shouted before erupting into a tirade. "True friends accept each other, both their strengths and weaknesses, and their abnormalities don't define them! You shouldn't be going around defining people by what's on the outside! Those _'popular'_ friends of yours are a bad influence!" She hissed the word popular like it was poison. "They're clouding your judgment! Kids these days don't treat each other right and hate each other for stupid reasons!"_

"_Kazuko. Please," Fukiko's father gently told his wife, Kazuko._

"_No! She's turning into a spoiled, selfish little brat because you're too soft on her, Masamune!" Kazuko shouted._

"_I am not selfish or spoiled!" Fukiko shouted back, appalled by her mother's anger._

"_If I don't put a leash on you, you will be! Now go to your room, young lady! You're grounded for two whole weeks! No computer, no I-Pod, no new clothes, no hanging out with those spoiled brats you call friends, nothing!" Kazuko shouted. "I have to go to a seminar on disabilities this weekend, and I'm taking you with me so you can learn to not blindly believe false stereotypes those friends are making you believe!"_

"_But that's not fair!" Fukiko shouted._

"_You shun Kyoya from everything and act like he was never your friend because he's in a wheelchair. Is that fair to him, Fukiko?" Masamune asked. "Do you really think ignoring him forever will make him normal again? That's not how life works, and that's especially not how friends treat each other. Let me put it this way: let's say you got into an accident and couldn't walk anymore, and then your own friends left you behind. You wouldn't like that, would you?"_

_Fukiko silently looked down at her feet, then pushed her father's arms off of her and dashed to her room. She plopped onto her bed and buried her face into her pillow. She wanted to get away from this harsh reality and these confusing questions, but the pillow didn't swallow her up like she wanted it to._

(end flashback)

"He's done so much for me, yet I repay him by ditching him because I was too freaked out by his being in a wheelchair…" Fukiko muttered sadly.

"Yeah, that wasn't very nice of you," Riko said casually like usual, albeit a little too honestly.

When Riko said that, Fukiko felt as though a knife pierced her heart. But she knew she couldn't deny it. At least she told it like it is and didn't bother to sugarcoat it. "Yeah. I'm so stupid. If I could turn back time and be a better friend to him, I would. I've been meaning to apologize to him for the past month, but...I can never seem to get the courage."

"You better do it. If you don't, he'll never know you feel bad about it," Riko told her.

Another good point.

"At least you really do feel sorry about it. That's a start, right? Sorry I thought you were a mean girl before," Riko said.

'_What?! She thinks I'm a mean girl?!'_ Fukiko thought, feeling slightly insulted by Riko's blunt comment. But then again, considering the way she treated Kyoya after the accident, perhaps she was right. _'I cared way more about fitting in and being popular than being a friend and being there when he needed me the most, so I guess she's not way off the mark,'_ Fukiko thought again sadly. She was also right in that if she doesn't apologize soon, they'll never be able to patch things up, and she might lose her chance to make amends if she waits too long.

"Thanks for listening, Tasogare. At least you're nice. I wish I could be as understanding and not freaked out by stuff as you are," Fukiko told her with a soft smile. Riko was going to say something more until the bell rang. The kids had to go back to class.

In English class, however, Mrs. Oginome had an announcement. "Alright, class. Over the next few weeks, each and every one of you will work on an individual report on a mammal of your choice. It can be a cat, rabbit, a whale, a kangaroo, whatever you like. But you'll have to present it to the class two weeks from now, and no two students can do a report on the same animal. Raise your hand and tell me which animal you want to work on so I can write it down," Mrs. Oginome explained near the end of class.

Riko couldn't believe her ears. They've been learning about the different types of animals for the past week and a half. Mammals are animals that are warm blooded, don't lay eggs with some exceptions, have body hair that protects them from the cold, and have heightened hearing. It was easy as pie to decide which animal she could do her report on.

"Can I work on the cat, please?" Riko asked a little loudly as she flung her hand up. Some kids laughed.

"Alright. Cat's taken. Anyone else?" Mrs. Oginome said as she scribbled something into her clipboard.

"I'll do one on the horse!"

"Oh! Oh! Can I get the whale?"

"No! I want the whale!"

"You get the kangaroo!"

"Can't we watch a movie? Reports are boring!"

Riko found herself smiling with delight. She can do a whole report on her all time favorite animal! She could get started right as she got home from school! But then again, it's not due for another two weeks, so she has plenty of time to work on it and do the research she needs. Plus, Sunbeam was still sick at home, so when she gets back, she has to take care of her.

However, while she was happy to be able to do a report on her favorite animal, another thought poked at her mind, and this one didn't make her the least bit happy: she has to go up in front of the class to present it. She has to stand in front of a huge group of people, who may or may not even be remotely interested in a report about cats. They might laugh at her, call her names, or she might end up humiliating herself in front of them, giving them more pretext to make fun of her, and they'll probably keep doing it forever and ever and ever. Riko never did like talking in front of other people.

Finally, the kids went back to their homerooms for the remainder of the class time...which was only ten minutes. The final bell reverberated throughout the school, and the kids dashed out of the school building, rejoicing in their freedom for the rest of the day. Saki came and picked Riko up. The overly excited little girl wasted no time dashing up the stairs to check on the fairies. She found Sunbeam asleep in her bed, just like this morning, with the microfiber cloth still on her head. But when Riko touched it, she noticed it was dry. She also noticed the plastic cup of water on her computer desk. She soaked the cloth in the water, folded it neatly, and put it back on Sunbeam's head. A little later on, she picked up the phone to call Hotaru.

"_Hello?"_

"Hotaru-chan? It's me."

"_It's been a while, Riko. How are you?"_

"I'm fine, but Sunbeam's sick. She's doing better than this morning, but Starbeam says stress and culture shock caused it, and I don't get it."

"_What don't you get?"_

"How stress or being in another planet can make someone sick."

"_I learned about this in my psychology class recently. If someone's dealing with a lot of problems-like studying a lot, worrying too much, no time to rest-it makes it easier for their bodies to be vulnerable to illness because certain parts of their bodies used to fight diseases are constantly being used to deal with other things."_

"Ohhh! I get it. So if you're sad a lot or worry too much, it's easier to get sick?"

"_Precisely."_

"But how does being in another country or planet make someone sick?"

"_This doesn't happen to everyone, but if someone's in a completely new country, far away from everything they know and learned, where everything is different from their home-from their manners to their technology-it might be so shocking that they feel like they're in another planet and not be able to adjust well. Let's look at the differences between America and Pakistan, for example. Pakistan is a country very deeply rooted in the past, not interested in technology and nice houses and freedom we enjoy. Women especially aren't treated well in Pakistan. Unlike places in America, where women can be anything they want, like doctors or political leaders and do things like wear pants, women in Pakistan aren't allowed to do anything like that. They're expected to wear only dresses and covers, and they're only allowed to be housewives and parents, nothing else. They're not even allowed to marry who they want to marry. Those are considered crimes worthy of the death penalty over there. So if they come to a place like America, where everything is nice and clean, where women are treated just as equally as the men and can do whatever they want without any fear or threats, she may not know what to do or how to live."_

'_A country that doesn't let women be anything they want to be? That must stink. I'm glad I was born in Japan,'_ Riko thought. She was lucky to be able to wear shorts and pants, especially since she hates skirts and dresses with a burning passion, cut her hair short, obsess over cats, and watch cartoons. Then again, her heart went out to whatever woman was living in that oppressive, totalitarian country. In regards to stress, Sunbeam was certainly going through a lot of it. "I see."

"_I'll come and visit this weekend. I'm sorry I don't get to hang out with you and the others much when monsters aren't attacking."_

"That's okay! I bet high school must be tough, so I didn't want to trouble you, even though I seem to trouble people no matter what."

"_Don't say that. I'm glad you called. For now, just be there for Sunbeam and take good care of her. A good friend is the best cure for any kind of illness. That's something one of my dads always says."_

"Wait, hold on. ONE of your dads?"

"_Yes. I have two dads. They're homosexual, but they're very nice."_

Riko found her jaw dropping to the ground. Hotaru has two dads? And they're homosexual? Riko's eyes were wide with surprise. Not with fear or hatred. She had seen shows about homosexual parents on TV, and Riko didn't notice anything wrong with it. If they love their child, then that's all that matters, right? And if they're nice, then why make a big deal out of it? Hotaru's the first person she's ever met who actually has two dads. Perhaps this is why she was nice to Hanae when she became Cure Starlight for the first time. They both have homosexual parents who love them very much. "Okay. I was just confused. I wasn't trying be mean or anything."

"_I know you're not. I've gotten worse responses than that."_

"Hey, Riko! Get off the phone! Dad needs to borrow it!" Rina shouted as she stomped into Riko's room.

"Keep it down! I'll be off in a second!" Riko snapped back, causing Rina to stamp out of her room. "Sorry. I have to go. My sister's being annoying."

"_Okay. I'd love it if you'd show me some of your drawings some time. Hikage tells me you're very good."_

"I'm not that good. I'll see you later. Bye!"

"_Bye, Riko-chan,"_ With that, Riko hung up the phone.

When dinner came around, Riko saved a good lot of it for the fairies, including Sunbeam, which they all happily and gratefully consumed. Riko's heart was aglow with joy, happy to be back among people (okay, fairies) who like her and appreciate what she does for them. She also brought some fresh water for Sunbeam to drink, which she did.

When night fell, Riko found herself snuggled in bed with a Deerling plushie tucked underneath one of her arms, sleeping soundly and peacefully, with Sunbeam next to her. At 9:30 PM, Sunbeam found herself waking up. She looked at the sleeping beauty next to her and smiled.

"Riko...my sisters...they've spent their whole day taking care of me. Thank you both," Sunbeam mused to herself sweetly as she gently stroke Riko's plump little cheek with her paw. _'I feel so blessed to have them in my lives. They're doing so much for me, even in the midst of all this tragedy and chaos,'_ Sunbeam thought as her eyes began to close on their own. Soon, she found herself back in dreamland. This time, no nightmares plagued her mind.

Footnotes:

1\. The Fiend With Twenty Faces is a novel by popular Japanese detective fiction writer Edogawa Ranpo. He's mostly known for being a short story writer, two of his shorts being "Stalker In The Attic" and "The Psychological Test."

2\. Fruits Basket is a well known shoujo manga by Natsuki Takaya.


	12. Road Trip To Rozaniela!

_**Warning: There are mentions of death, corpses, and some minor sexism.**_

* * *

Chapter 12: The Pretty Cure's Space Bound Road Trip To Rozaniela!

"Achoo!" With a great sneeze, Zenjin blew a cloud of germs into his room as he slumped in his gaudy bed. Beileag leapt off the bed, shuddering with disgust.

"Ew, Zenjin! Cover your mouth when you sneeze!" Beileag complained as she grabbed a random bottle of lime green hand sanitizer from his bureau and rubbed it on her hands, taking care to avoid the many bracelets that were decorating her wrists.

"Hey! I can't help it! How am I supposed to know when I sneeze?!" Zenjin blurted out hoarsely, his normally squeaky, dissonant voice becoming harsh and dry. A large droplet of snot dribbled out of his nose, dangling from it like a wind chime. Beileag grabbed a bag of tissues and handed one of Zenjin. He yanked it out of her hand rather brusquely and wiped his nose with it. "UUUGH! My head feels like it's gonna explode!"

"Yeah, and you're spreading your germs around. If I get a disease or catch your cold, it'll be your fault! Now where's the bathroom? I don't want to get sick, and my beautiful complexion's in jeopardy!" Beileag exclaimed as she scrambled around to find a bathroom.

Decebal walked into the room holding a silver platter like a waiter with a huge array of breakfast foods on it. A cup of chocolate flavored yogurt, a glass of cold milk with ice cubes floating in it, a huge pile of pancakes with butter on top of it, covered with maple syrup, and with blueberries and strawberries scattered around it, some salty crackers, and another plate of French toast with cinnamon and maple syrup on it. When Beileag came out of the bathroom, feeling clean at last after washing her face with water and rose scented soap, she saw Decebal place the silver platter on a stool in front of Zenjin.

"Wooooow! What a spread! It looks like it came out of a super duper fancy five star restaurant or something!" Beileag chirped, awestruck by the beauty and orderliness of the breakfast Decebal made. Zenjin immediately began scarfing down the milk, proceeding to completely ruin the meticulousness of it with his wolf-like eating. "Whoa! Zenjin! Don't eat it all at once, and chew your food! You'll choke!"

"Dun dell meh whadda dooh, beereeg!" Zenjin snapped back with a huge wad of French toast stuffed in his mouth, with some maple syrup spilling onto his midnight black pajama shirt.

"I TOLD you not to call me Beileag!" Beileag snapped once Zenjin took a bite out of another piece of French toast.

"It's your name, so if you're Beileag, then you're Beileag! Get over it!" Zenjin snapped as he threw the unfinished piece of French toast at her. It plopped right on her face and proceeded to fall on the floor, leaving a gob of butter and maple syrup on her cheek.

"Ewwww! Gross! Now I have to clean up again!" Beileag complained as she zipped into the bathroom again to clean up the mess on her face.

"I hate girls. They're always so fussy over the stupidest things," Zenjin mused as he began chomping rather grossly and hastily on his salty crackers.

"That's how women are, Zenny boy. But Beileag does mean well. She has been taking care of you for five years after all," Decebal told him as he twirled a curl of his long green hair with his glove covered finger.

"Pheh! Like I care! Ugh! I need to blow something up!" Zenjin screamed vehemently, his throat feeling like the skin was being scratched at by a cat that thinks it's a scratching post. With a swing of his arm, he threw a ball of purple energy at the wall, causing it to explode into a big cloud of black smoke. When it faded, all that remained was a big hole in the wall the size of a car, a huge pile of debris, and a completely flummoxed and surprised Beileag, whose face, clothes, and hair were all covered with patches of smoke.

"Okay. That was so, like, totally not necessary," Beileag piped in.

"Shut up, you drama queen. I'll fix it," Zenjin grumbled as he snapped his fingers. The debris returned to the wall and regenerated. The wall magically fixed itself.

"That's the Energia for you. Now I know why our ancestors wanted to seal their powers in it and hide it all this time," Decebal mused, awestruck by the powers that Zenjin has taken for himself.

"I wish I had the Energia. I could open my own fashion shop, make the most beautiful dresses in the world, and have everyone bow down before my beauty!" Beileag said as she wiped her face with a towel that was in the bathroom.

"You? Beautiful? Hah! That's as likely as people giving birth to baby mutated abominations with snake heads and no bodies to keep their organs in one place! Or finding a severed ear in the grass! Or Decebal watching sitcoms about fluffy bunnies in a hotel room!" Zenjin laughed heartily as he said that, banging his hand on the stool a few times. Then he erupted into a coughing fit.

"Oh, like you care!" Beileag complained.

"Go get his medicine," Decebal told her.

"Fine. Whatever," Beileag rolled her eyes as she left the room to get his medicine. _'Zenjin knows nothing of my beauty! Why does he always have to be so bratty and childish and rude?! Then again, boys are like that, after all, except for Decebal. At least he knows how beautiful I am,'_ Beileag thought to herself before sighing in exhaustion after three too many self cleanings.

"Tch! This is no fun! I should be out there gathering intel! I can't just sit here all day!" Zenjin complained as he knocked the silver platter off his bed, sending it crashing to the floor. All of the remaining food spilled onto the floor.

"You're going to have to. You can't push yourself too hard, or you'll end up sicker than you are now, and you'll have to spend MORE time in the house instead of gathering information," Decebal told him.

"BLEEEEEEGH!" Zenjin wailed hoarsely as he flopped back into bed. "This sucks," He said in a softer voice. "Achoo!" More snot dripping from his nose. Decebal handed him another tissue for him to wipe his nose with.

"Here! Gots his medicine!" Beileag leaped into the room cheerfully with the orange medicine bottle in her hand. She threw it to Decebal like it was a baseball. Decebal caught it without a hitch.

"Thank you, Billie. Also, since Zenjin's sick, would you mind going to Earth and gathering information? Someone has to stay here and look after him," Decebal told her with a suave looking smile, which made Beileag's heart go aflutter and her eyes turn into hearts.

"Ooooooh yessiree! I'll be more than happy to! I've been dying to go to Earth for weeks now! Do you know if they take Rozanielan money?" Beileag chirped cheerfully.

"Try not to get distracted, okay? We need to keep our priorities straight," Decebal told her.

"Okie dokie loki! Off to Earth I go! Wheeeee!" Beileag cheered as she spread her arms out straight like a plane and ran out of the room, pretending to be an airplane.

"Yay. She's gone. She's so freakin' annoying-achoo!" Zenjin complained, followed by another dribbly sneeze. "She better not bring back any dresses!"

"She can be quite a feather brained ditz at times. Even I find her constant enthusiasm to be a bit nauseating, along with those hippie clothes she wears all the time," Decebal said as he opened the medicine bottle. "Alright. Time for your medicine, Zenny boy."

"Ugh, no! That stuff tastes gross!" Zenjin complained.

* * *

"Hey Marina-chan? What's Blue Moon?" Moonbeam asked as she sat in Marina's room. She was eyeing a poster featuring two girls, a blue haired one with a pink and orange guitar to match her frilly outfit, and a silver haired one with a silver microphone, contrasting with her purple and black outfit. The two girls looked to be in their teens, standing under multicolored spotlights, with smiles that seemed to light up the whole poster. The bottom of the poster features the audience in black, holding and waving little lights with pink handles and glowing bulbs shaped like ribbons.

"You wanna know? They're a band that was pretty huge before I was born. I just got into them a few months ago. I love their music! They don't pull any punches and they always singing about good stuff, like getting along, being yourself, taking time to understand people, all that jazz!" Marina explained cheerfully, her goldenrod eyes lighting up upon mentioning the band name. "The blue haired girl is Kinou Asa, the guitarist, and the silver haired girl is Nakaya Yoko, the singer. They stopped making music for a while because of some stuff, but now they're back like they were never gone! Their newest single, Unison Second, just came out and it sold 5 million copies within two days!"

"That's awesome! I'd love to listen to their music! Do you have any CDs?" Moonbeam asked, her silver eyes glimmering with interest.

"I sure do! Where did I put them?" Marina asked as she looked under her bed and rummaged around to find those CDs. She found old school books, ripped binders, some stuffed animals, some socks, a shirt, and a few CDs. "Ah! Found them!" She pulled out three CDs and showed them to Moonbeam. The CD names in question are, _'Circus,'_ _'Etherium,'_ and _'Andante's Song.'_

"You said they stopped making music for a while. Why is that?" Moonbeam asked as she looked at the back of Etherium.

"Well, it's kind of a long story," Marina said.

"I don't mind. I love stories!"

"Okay then. They were pretty big back when they started, but after a few years, they got into a fight and broke up. Then they fell into hard times and started doing things they shouldn't have, like smoking pot and selling drugs and arguing with each other like crazy. This turned off their fans, and they both got put on house arrest for a few years. Thankfully, that made them realize what they've done and just last year they announced their comeback. They didn't expect their former fans to like them again, but they did! That's what I like best about their story," Marina said, looking at the poster and putting her hands on her chest like she was praying to God. "Even when they made bad decisions and made mistakes that cost them dearly, their fans never stopped believing in them. They didn't assume they'd be bad forever despite having some detractors. Their fans completely welcomed them back with handmade posters, glow lights, shirts, merchandise, everything. Some fans even brought their children with them. They're the reason why I want to be a rock star when I grow up. If they can have fans who still love them despite their background and mistakes, then who's to say I can't have fans who like me for who I am?"

"That's such a sweet story," Moonbeam said.

"I know, right?" Marina said with a smile.

"Umm...I was also wondering...exactly how'd you get that scar on your cheek?" Moonbeam asked.

"Oh? This?" Marina asked, pointing to the scar on her left cheek. "Some crazy lady attacked me with a garden trowel, saying _'you're the man who ruined my life!'_ and stuff like that."

"Ouch! How come you didn't get it removed?"

"We don't have the money. Mom's working two jobs just to pay the bills and put food on the table," Marina replied.

"Marina! Dinner's ready!" Hatoko called out from downstairs.

"Be down in a second!" Marina called back. "I'll bring some up for you. Okay?" Marina told her kindly as she dashed out of her room and into the dining room. Moonbeam found herself alone in Marina's music filled bedroom, surrounded by the many posters of the various bands and singers she likes.

Moonbeam looked down at the moon shaped clip on her sky blue bow. She tapped it, causing it to glow in a silver light. A light popped out of her ribbon and appeared in front of her. The light dissipated and out came a very tiny laptop about Moonbeam's size, pink in color with some multicolored flowers painted on it. It had a small screen and a small keyboard. Moonbeam began typing on it. Some static appeared on the screen.

"Please connect this time. Please connect…" Moonbeam prayed out loud as she typed some more. The static on the screen danced around until it finally began to form a clear image. The image shown on the screen was a woman with sterling silver hair, donning a feathered Native American style feathered headdress. She had green eyes like Riko and Kyoya, but in a much lighter shade.

"_Moonbeam? Is that you, Moonbeam?"_ The silver haired woman on the screen asked in a very beautiful, elegant, lady-like voice.

Moonbeam let out a joyous yelp. "Queen Malgorzata!"

"_It is you, dear! It's been so long, hasn't it?"_ Queen Malgorzata exclaimed with a sweet, joyful smile on her face.

"It has been! I've been trying to contact you with this ComLap for so long, but it never worked until now! I'm so glad you're alright! You looked so terrible the last time we saw you! How are you? How are things on Rozaniela?" Moonbeam asked happily, her silver eyes aglow with relief. The Queen was alive and well.

"_I appreciate your concern, dear. I'm doing much better now, and the citizens and I are striving to restore what's left of Rozaniela back to its original state. The citizens are much more resilient than I thought they'd be considering they've never been in this kind of crisis before,"_ Queen Malgorzata told her with a chuckle. But then her face became somewhat downcast. _"Unfortunately, because of Zenjin's greed and treachery, many of our citizens have died. However, we're not going to let his malice bring us down. By the way, have you found the Pretty Cure yet?"_

"Yes I have! Four of them, and they're super duper nice! I've been dying to tell you about them, but for some reason the ComLap could never get through to you!" Moonbeam exclaimed, finding herself talking faster than normal.

"_King Ghislain had to cut off communications between our dimension and the one you're in for safety reasons. That's why. I'm glad your mission went well. I'm only sorry I had to send you and your sisters to a completely different planet considering everything that's happened. I didn't want you girls to get hurt or even killed,"_ The Queen replied kindly.

"_My Lady! We saved some more alicorns!"_ Someone on Malgorzata's end shouted jubilantly.

'_Alicorns are being saved?! There _is_ hope for Rozaniela after all!'_ Moonbeam screamed in her head.

"_That's wonderful, Jervis! I'll be there to oversee their health in just a moment. I just need to finish a few things,"_ Queen Malgorzata told the man, Jervis, then turned back to the screen. _"Sorry about that, Moonbeam."_

"No no! That's good! Hey! Does that mean me and my sisters can come and visit you? I'd love to introduce you to the Pretty Cure!" Moonbeam asked enthusiastically.

"_I would like that. But I wouldn't recommend it right now,"_ The Queen told her.

"Why not?"

"_It's been very busy since Zenjin took the Energia, and there's still rescue efforts taking place. Plus, it might be a bit dangerous for you and your sisters to come here now. We don't know where Zenjin is, nor what he's planning. But I'll be free in a few days, so you and your friends can come and visit then,"_ The Queen explained kindly.

"I see. Okay then," Moonbeam said, looking a little downcast.

"_Don't look so down, Moonbeam. We have to stay positive. I have to go, so-"_

"Wait! One more thing!"

"_What is it, dear?"_

Moonbeam had been dying to ask about this, and now seemed like the perfect time. "Tell me. Are Mom and Dad...alive?" Moonbeam's silver eyes watered. She looked like she was about to cry.

The Queen smiled softly. _"Yes, they are. Rest assured. They are alive and well. In fact, Hornbeam's been taking care of survivors left and right, and I can't even count the amount of lives he and the other medical staff have saved."_

Moonbeam couldn't help but jump for joy. She jumped so hard she made a set of Marina's bongos fall off the bed and onto the floor. They didn't break. "YEEESSS! MOM AND DAD ARE ALIVE! Yaaaaay! I can't wait to tell my sisters about this!" Moonbeam squealed loudly as she jumped all over Marina's bed, unable to contain her relief and excitement. Malgorzata laughed.

"_It makes me happy to see you smile. I have to go now, Moonbeam. You take care. Bye!"_ Malgorzata told her with a smile, and the ComLap's screen went black.

Moonbeam just couldn't contain her utter relief. For about a month, she had been dying to know if her parents were alive or not, and not knowing anything about their fate made her want to go absolutely crazy. But now, she couldn't be happier than a clown if she tried. Moonbeam squealed, cheered, jumped, flew, and shouted all over the place, bouncing off the walls. She even wound up accidentally knocking off one of Marina's Michael Jackson posters, sending it fluttering to the floor. A couple guitar picks fell off of Marina's desk, scattering onto the floor.

"Uhh...you're making my room a mess, Moonbeam," Marina said as she stopped in her room with a plate of garlic shells, chicken, and two crescent rolls in her hands, along with a fork and a knife. When Moonbeam heard Marina's voice, she stopped and noticed the mess.

"Oh! I'm so sorry! I'll clean up right away!" Moonbeam told her apologetically and proceeded to put the poster she ran into back on the wall. She then gathered the fallen guitar picks and put them back on the desk, all on top of each other. "I didn't mean to make a mess. Honest."

"That's okay. What are you so hyped up about anyway? Mom thought I forgot to turn off my boom box," Marina told her as she put the plate on her desk. Then she noticed the ComLap. "And when did you get a little laptop?"

"Oh, oh, oh, Marina-chan! I am just soooooo happy right now! Guess what? I managed to contact the queen of my world!" Moonbeam exclaimed loudly and happily. "I found out my queen's okay and my parents are alive and we can go to Rozaniela now! Ohhh! I know! How about I take you there this weekend?!"

"Uhh...what?"

* * *

Moonbeam couldn't wait for the weekend to come. When she told everyone, including Kyoya, about what Moonbeam did, they decided to meet in the park where the giant guinea pig attacked that weekend so they could talk about everything. Finally, after much impatient waiting, the weekend finally arrived. The girls, Kyoya, and the fairies met in the little park. The fairies were beside themselves with joy.

"Oh my gosh oh my gosh oh my gosh oh my gosh Mom and Dad are seriously alive this is so awesome they're not dead yay!" Sunbeam chirped as she flitted around like an annoying housefly.

"What a wonderful development! My heart is completely consumed by a tsunami of relief! Mother and father are alive and well and haven't perished from Zenjin's nefarious reign of destruction and terror! They have survived the tragedy! And not only that, the dimensions between Earth and Rozaniela have finally become aligned again, allowing communication to be carried out via Communication Laptop again! What a joyous occasion! What relief! This is cause for a celebration! Does anyone happen to have any Rozanielan fairy juice on their person? I have never felt such happiness, and it's increasing exponentially by each passing meter! Why, I feel as though I might explode in a rain of happiness!" Starbeam palavered happily, using bigger words than usual.

"I know, right?! This is sooooo wonderful! Mom and Dad are alive!" Moonbeam cheered in a loud voice. The girls and Kyoya thought was was strange since she usually speaks in a soft, timid voice. Nobody bothered to notice Lovebeam looking away from the group with a pouty, chubby face.

"Umm...that's all well and good, girls, but we have some questions we'd like to ask, if you don't mind," Kyoya said, raising his hand to stop the three fairy sisters from getting carried away.

"Oh. Yes. Terribly sorry about our childish and inopportune outbursts. What questions do you wish for us to answer?" Starbeam said sheepishly, her blue face donning streaks of pink on her cheeks.

"For starters, what's that little laptop you have there? Is it part of your world?" Hotaru asked.

"Yep! This is what everyone calls the Communication Laptop, or ComLap for short. Yeah, it's a silly name, I know. If people and fairies have them and are in different dimensions, they can talk to each other with it. Kind of like cell phones. But you can't use these on the same planet. It only works when the recipients are in two different dimensions. It also only works when the two dimensions are aligned, as that's when communication between different dimensions is possible. Our ancestors checked," Moonbeam explained as lucidly as she could.

"How can dimensions be aligned? I don't get it," Anzu said, shifting her glasses a little bit.

"Me either," Riko piped in.

"Our ancestors made it that way. They had God-like powers, so they could do whatever they wanted. King Ghislain and Queen Malgorzata can do it too," Sunbeam explained.

"So how come you weren't able to talk to the King and Queen until now?" Hotaru asked.

"The dimensions weren't aligned, because the King threw them out of whack after we got sent out to find the Pretty Cure. He and the Queen probably figured since Zenjin just got the Energia and might not be able to know how to align the different dimensions, he wouldn't be able to come back to Rozaniela if he tried," Sunbeam explained further. "The Queen told me that when I contacted her a few days ago."

"But now the dimensions are aligned again! Not only can we communicate with everyone there, we can go there, too! That's why I had you all gather here! I really want to take you all to Rozaniela and introduce you to the Queen, King, and our parents!" Moonbeam chirped cheerfully. "...if it's not still a barren mess."

"Sounds awesome! I'd love to go!" Riko said with a smile. A real life fantasy world, one like in books and anime...Riko never thought she'd ever see the day where she'd get to go to another world. Just the thought of it was making her jump up and down happily while flapping her hands. Marina looked away upon seeing this.

"But won't our parents worry? We can't be gone for too long, or they'll think we got kidnapped," Kyoya piped in with some concern in his voice.

"He has a point. Don't you have some kind of time freezing spell that'll stop time here?" Riko asked as she ceased her jumping and hand flapping.

"Unfortunately, no," Moonbeam said. "That's one of the powers that our ancestors had, which they then sealed in the Energia. None of us have that kind of power. Sorry."

"But we promise we won't remain there for very long. We'll be sure to return you to your homes safe and sound, and at a reasonable time, before the day ends," Starbeam said.

"I'm not too sure about this," Hotaru murmured doubtfully, raising an eyebrow. "I know you girls mean well, but if we leave our town unattended, Zenjin and Decebal might use the opportunity to do what they want and we won't even know it or be able to stop it."

"Another good point," Kyoya said.

"We don't have a solution to that either. Sorry," Sunbeam said.

"Well, how about this? I can stay here and if I see any Corrupt Sentinels walking around, I can call one of you girls and tell you about it so you can come back and fight it," Kyoya suggested.

"That's a great idea!" Moonbeam exclaimed.

"But we'll be on another planet! How can phone calls even work in between planets?" Riko asked.

"I don't know how, but interplanetary phone calls are indeed possible. In fact, the first ever interplanetary telephone conversation was initiated in 1969, when one of the first astronauts who set foot on the moon, Neil Armstrong, called Richard Nixon, one of the presidents of the United States back then. This was long before they had cell phones," Hotaru explained with a cheerful smile.

"Sounds good to me. I'll stay here and keep an eye on things," Kyoya said, impressed by Hotaru's knowledge.

"Aww. I really wish you could come with us. There's so much we want to show you!" Moonbeam said.

"Me too. I don't want to leave you out," Riko said, agreeing with Moonbeam.

"But since the dimensions are aligned, we can go back and forth from Earth to Rozaniela anytime now, so I'm sure he can come with us another time-" Starbeam explained until she got cut off.

"Kyo-chan should go with you. I'll stay!" Lovebeam interjected, causing everyone to turn their heads to look at her slightly pouty, chubby face.

"You want to stay here?" Marina asked curiously.

"Yes. I'm sorry to say this, but...I don't want to go to Rozaniela!" Lovebeam elaborated.

"What?!" All three of her sisters yelped in perfect unison. Lovebeam doesn't want to go and visit her home planet? All of the kids looked at each other with confused faces. Lovebeam doesn't want to go to her home planet?

"Why don't you want to come?" Moonbeam asked.

"I just don't! I can stay and look after things here. Take Kyo-chan with you. He deserves this much," Lovebeam replied. Starbeam and Moonbeam looked at each other with confusion on their faces, just like the kids were doing now.

Sunbeam, however, was livid. "Are you seriously saying you don't want to visit Mom and Dad?! The Queen and King?! Do you even care about their welfare at all?! Aren't you even the least bit concerned for their well being?! What about your friends and the rest of the planet?! You're so selfish and inconsiderate!" Sunbeam shouted in a loud voice that caused Riko to cover her ears frightfully, intimidated by the screechiness of her yelling.

"Of course I'm concerned, and I am NOT inconsiderate! I just-" Lovebeam tried to contradict her, but Sunbeam's so mad she won't even let her older sister explain herself.

"Admit it! You don't care about Mom or Dad or anyone on there at all! You just want to stay here and have fun and lollygag while everyone else is either dead, hurt, or working their butts off to preserve what's left of the planet and whatever survivors are left! You're a selfish and inconsiderate little coward!" Sunbeam yelled vehemently.

"Will you calm down?!" Moonbeam exclaimed as she flew in between her quarreling sisters.

"Stop being soft on her, Moonbeam! You know it and I know it! She doesn't care about Mom and Dad or anyone else at all!" Sunbeam yelled.

"You don't know that. She has a point that someone needs to stay and watch over the town and call us if Zenjin makes trouble again. Besides, Lovebeam might not be ready to face Rozaniela yet. We don't even know if it's still a desolate wasteland or not, and she might not want to see what's left of it. Some people can handle it just fine while others can't. You shouldn't make decisions for other people, and if they say they don't want to do something, you shouldn't force it," Moonbeam told her lucidly.

"Urrrgh! Lovebeam's like this because you keep letting her do what she wants!" Sunbeam yelled.

"Alright, enough!" Marina shouted, causing everyone to stop yelling and Riko to cover her ears in fright. "You know what? Let's ALL go to Rozaniela! No ifs, ands, buts, complaining, crying, screaming, whining, puking, belly-aching or any of that garbage! That's final!" Marina edicted loudly.

"That's right! Tell it like it is, Mari-chan!" Sunbeam cheered.

"Not helping!" Moonbeam grumbled out loud.

Lovebeam crossed her arms and looked away. "I still don't see why I have to!"

"Well, we're all going, so we might as well cast the spell," Starbeam said.

The four fairies formed a circle. The accessories on their ribbons and their hair clips all glowed radiantly in their respective colors. A very small, rainbow colored circle appeared under them, which suddenly grew in size. The girls, fairies, and Kyoya all fell in. They found themselves floating in a glowing tunnel surrounded by lights in all colors of the rainbow.

"Wow! Are we actually flying?!" Anzu exclaimed, her lime green eyes wide with wonder and curiosity.

"This is so cool!" Kyoya said as he fastened the seat belt on his wheelchair to keep from falling out.

"I never knew something like this existed. What a fascinating discovery," Hotaru mused, in awe of the glowing magical tunnel they're floating through.

"This is the safest way to go back and forth between dimensions and planets. Plus, the laws of gravity don't apply here, so that's why you're not falling or screaming for your lives," Sunbeam explained.

"Soooo pretty!" Riko said happily as she found herself spinning around in the glowing tunnel like a top, giggling and watching all the pretty, colorful lights spin around her.

"Are we there yet? I'm starting to see spots," Marina said.

"Oh! There it is!" Moonbeam darted on ahead.

Kyoya found himself next to Lovebeam, who silently floated next to him, continuing to make a face a bratty child would make if they had been put in time out. "What's wrong, Lovebeam?" Kyoya asked.

"I wish they didn't force me to come with them," Lovebeam mused petulantly.

"Sorry we kinda forced you into this. But can I ask why you don't want to?" Kyoya asked without any persistence or malice in his voice.

"I'd like to, but it's complicated. Plus if I did say, you'd take it the wrong way and call me inconsiderate or selfish or a brat, just like Sunbeam did," Lovebeam replied.

"No I wouldn't. I'd like to know. But feel free to tell me when you're ready. Okay? I'd be more than happy to listen," Kyoya told her.

Lovebeam found herself surprised. She expected him to react the same way Sunbeam did, but he didn't. _'He actually wants to listen to me?'_ Lovebeam asked herself. However, before she could say anything else, the glowing tunnel of light faded.

The fairies expected Rozaniela to still be a desolate, barren wasteland, with no signs of beauty or life at all. But much to their surprise, it's not as bad as it originally was. Instead, the sky was a peachy pink color, with the white sun shining brightly. The trees had little newborn leaves growing from them. The ground beneath their feet was an ocean of grass, with some flower buds sprouting from beneath the soil.

Just the sight of their rejuvenated planet left the fairies frozen with awe. But the girls and Kyoya were frozen with awe for other reasons. For one thing, they're in a completely new world, with a pink sky and a white sun, which is very unnatural. Riko could see some pretty purple butterflies fluttering about on the gentle breeze, watching them as they frolicked in the sky happily.

"Is this really your world? It's beautiful!" Anzu mused, her lime green eyes wide with wonder, awestruck by the new environment.

"Yeek! Look!" Moonbeam squealed as she pointed to a tall cliff that towered over them. The kids and fairies turned around to find four horses standing on the edge of a cliff, looking at them with kind, soft eyes.

Winged horses. With horns on their heads. With sparkling, rainbow manes that shimmered underneath the sun's rays.

"Real winged unicorns! Wow! They're so beautiful!" Riko exclaimed, her green eyes bursting with awe and excitement. "I want to pet them! Do you think they'll let me?!" As soon as she said that, the four winged unicorns turned around, flapped their large wings, and ascended into the sky gracefully. Their slender legs galloped as they soared in the air gracefully like angels. "Awww. I scared them off. As usual."

"It's not your fault. Alicorns are very timid creatures who prefer to stay out of public view unless circumstances say otherwise," Starbeam explained.

"I'd love to ride one of those someday," Anzu said wistfully, already wishing the alicorns didn't fly away.

"Me too. They're so majestic," Hotaru said.

"Hey! Look over there!" Kyoya yelped, which prompted the girls and fairies to turn around. They saw some humans and plushy looking fairies carrying some debris with wheelbarrows. Others were carrying makeshift stretchers with some injured people on them, while some doctors, both human and fairy, tended to their wounds.

"Think we might be close to a town?" Marina asked.

"Let's go! We might find the Queen there!" Sunbeam exclaimed.

As the kids and fairies walked through whatever part of the planet they're in, they began to see the extent of the damage Zenjin did on the planet. More piles of destroyed houses, charred trees black as coal, some hastily made graves, and people scurrying about trying to give food, medicine, and treatment to anyone who's injured or in need came into view. It's definitely not as desolate and barren as when the Queen ordered Lovebeam and her sisters to chase Zenjin to Earth, but the scent of despair still persisted. But the kids and fairies also saw courage, resilience, confidence, jubilance, and even some gaiety among the citizens.

They could hear a group of people cheering and rejoicing loudly about a few feet away. A woman and her baby, both covered in debris, had been pulled out of a destroyed house, and some citizens rushed to put her on a makeshift stretcher and give her and her baby medicine. Other people and fairies built makeshift houses, a makeshift hospital, and even a makeshift restaurant. The people took the woman and her baby to their nearby makeshift hospital, where they were greeted by staff who were ready for the job like they predicted it years in advance. Others gathered at the makeshift restaurant, receiving all kinds of food and necessities, like warm soup, fruit, vegetables, fresh bread, etc. Some fairies shared their food with some hungry, injured children, who received it warmly and gratefully. Some young boys in their early teens were wrapping gauze around a young alicorn's injured leg.

People of all ages and nationalities are carrying debris away with wheelbarrows, while others still searched in other piles of it, calling out to people who might be trapped underneath. Others continued to dig with their bare hands, magic spells, or machines. Medical staff scurried about like mice, rushing to anyone who's injured, sick, or in need of immediate attention. Some fairies gave bottles of water to people who were thirsty. Other kids and fairies were happily playing around, happy to at least be outside.

"It's hard to believe Rozaniela was so desolate when we left…" Moonbeam mused with a glimmer of hope and relief in her sterling silver eyes. "Everyone's working together to help each other out and do whatever they can to get the planet back on it's feet, even when they just got hit with the biggest disaster ever."

Even Lovebeam couldn't help but smile. "That just goes to show how strong everybody is. I'm glad they're alright," Lovebeam said.

Marina looked around the area like some sailor on a ship looking for land. "So where's this Queen of yours?" Marina asked.

"She should be around here somewhere," Sunbeam said as they decided to walk further.

"So what's your Queen like? Is she nice?" Kyoya asked curiously.

"Oh, I'm glad you asked! She's one of the nicest people on all of Rozaniela! In fact, she's been around since our ancestors put their all of energy into the Energia many years ago! She's sweet, kind, caring, beautiful, regal, elegant, bold, brave, and everything else! She likes to do lots of things normal queens don't normally do, like jousting, sewing clothes for charities, sculpting, and sword fighting! Not only is she beautiful and elegant, she's brave and strong, too!" Lovebeam explained happily.

"Oh! There she is! Look!" Moonbeam exclaimed as they came upon the remains of a destroyed town, albeit in the process of getting rebuilt by some determined and persistent volunteers.

They came upon a group of people who were receiving boxes of fresh, brand new, hand made clothes from a silver haired woman dressed in Native American clothing. The woman's long hair was mostly let down, with little braids dangling from it decorated with multicolored beads, like crimson red and aqua blue. On her head was a Native American feathered headdress with white crest feathers with black and crimson red tips. The woman was wearing a beige shawl over a matching beige long sleeved shirt and pants, all with blue strings wrapped around the cuffs. She was also wearing soft, pale brown Indian moccasins with little wiggly noodle-like streamers dangling from the top of them and pale violet purple ribbons donning them. The woman wasn't wearing any war paint anywhere, not even on her round face. Her eyes were green, and her smile was soft and beautiful, framed with pink lips as she handed more clothes to a woman and her children, who were in tatters and rags.

"Thank you so very much, my Queen. You have no idea how grateful we are for your generosity," The dirty, tattered woman with a little boy and girl clutching her ripped skirt told her gratefully. The Native American dressed woman flashed a royal but sweet smile.

"You're very welcome. You and your children deserve it. Here are some for your husband, too. You'd best get to the hospital and see him," The Queen told her, handing her another bag of fresh clothes. The woman bowed again as she took the bag and left with her two children in tow. She then turned to the rest of the people. "Everyone! There is still much to be done! But if you wish to take a break, feel free to do so!"

"Come on, everyone! There might still be survivors in need of help!" One woman edicted proudly. They ran off to find more piles of debris in case there are more people in need of rescue.

The fairies couldn't take it anymore. "Malgorzataaaaa!" In perfect unison, Moonbeam, Sunbeam, Starbeam, and Lovebeam all flew toward their beloved queen, glomping her and rubbing themselves into her shawl. The Queen, albeit surprised, embraced the four fairies warmly.

"Oh my! You came back!" The Queen said kindly, stroking the wailing fairy sisters gently. "I suppose it's only natural you'd want to visit. I'm so happy to see that you're all okay."

"Queen! Queen! We brought the Pretty Cure here and a friend of theirs! Come see! Come on!" Moonbeam insisted as she took the Queen by the hand and gently, albeit impatiently, escorted her to the kids. They were in awe of the Queen's appearance. Sunbeam, Starbeam, and Lovebeam joined in.

"These are our friends!" Sunbeam exclaimed cheerfully, her blue eyes radiant with joy from seeing the Queen, relief in seeing her looking much better than she was when she left, and excitement from impatiently wanting to introduce her friends to her. Riko shyly hid behind Hotaru the minute the Queen came over. "This is Tasogare Riko, Cure Twilight, the tall one is Minamigawa Hotaru, Cure Starlight, the blonde haired one is Chino Anzu, Cure Dawn, and the orange haired girl is Asagi Marina, Cure Dusk! The boy is Mitomo Kyoya. He's not a Cure, but he's our friend, too!"

"We're very honored to be in your presence, your royal majesty," Hotaru bowed politely before the queen. Anzu, Marina, Riko, and Kyoya followed suit, but Riko continued to hide behind Hotaru. The Queen offered her hand out to Hotaru, who warmly smiled and gently shook her hand.

"My, what lovely girls you are. I'm so happy to see you all. But you needn't concern yourselves with formalities. Feel free to call me Malgorzata, or just Queen Mal," The Queen, Malgorzata, told her kindly.

Moonbeam flitted over to Riko. "Don't be shy. The Queen is super duper nice and friendly! She won't bite," Moonbeam told her reassuringly.

"Sorry. I can't help it," Riko whispered shyly.

"Would it be alright if you showed me your Heart Lighters? I just want to see definitive proof that you are the Pretty Cure," Queen Malgorzata asked politely.

"Sure! Here's mine!" Marina exclaimed as she yanked out her orange Heart Lighter. Everyone else followed suit.

"Yes. These Heart Lighters are genuine, and they've chosen you," Queen Malgorzata said. "I take it you have a lot of questions. Let's go over there. We can sit down and discuss everything then," She said, pointing to an empty meadow with some rectangle shaped rocks lying around. The kids, fairies, and the Queen walked over to the rocks, which made great benches.

Hotaru, Anzu, and Marina sat on one big rock while Kyoya, still in his wheelchair, sat next to it. Riko sat right next to him on the grass, her legs in a criss-cross position. Moonbeam and Sunbeam sat right with her, while Lovebeam sat in Kyoya's lap and Starbeam on Hotaru's.

"I must first apologize for involving you in this mess," Queen Malgorzata began, her emerald eyes slightly somber and apologetic. "We had no idea any of this would happen, and I'd rather you stay out of this mess so you could be safe and live normal lives, but as you can see, the circumstances are dire for both my world and yours."

"It's quite alright, Queen. We're just curious as to how this whole mess happened in the first place," Hotaru told her reassuringly.

"How was your planet created?" Anzu asked.

"How were the Heart Lighters and the Pretty Cure created?" Marina asked.

"Who is Zenjin and why did he do what he did?" Kyoya asked.

"Now now, one at a time. I'll explain everything from the beginning," The Queen said, a little overwhelmed by their line of questioning. "Our ancestors were an alien race whose powers were limitless. They could do everything, from telekinesis to creating planets with their own oxygen and ozone layers. But soon they grew to hate each other because of their growing arrogance, and many died as a result. Those remaining found Earth and wanted to live there, but they didn't like how the humans treated each other. They didn't like the expectations they put on their generations, like extremely strict gender roles, disdain for anything that wasn't perfectly normal, and general corruption. True, I know this wasn't always the case, but our ancestors decided Earth wasn't a good place to live. They were, however, very shocked at the way some orphans were treated in third world countries. It was about a hundred years ago that they decided to create the planet we're on now, so they could not only make a home for themselves and us, but for the huge troves of mistreated and abused babies they would take with them-"

"Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa! Hold up!" Marina interjected. "You say your ancestors just up and stole a bunch of babies from third world orphanages?"

"Mari-chan! It's rude to interrupt!" Riko scolded mildly, annoyed by Marina's lack of manners.

"Yes, it's true," Malgorzata confessed casually.

"You do realize you've been kidnapping huge amounts of babies for about a century, right?" Marina asked.

"You raise a valid point. But the babies were suffering greatly, and the people who were supposed to take care of them couldn't care less about their welfare. I will confess, we were hasty in our endeavor and just took them but their caretakers really couldn't care less about them. That's why we only limited our rescues to run down orphanages in third world countries, because nobody cares about whether huge troves of children go missing or not," Malgorzata explained. "Besides, if we didn't save them, they would have died! Did you know that babies can actually die if they don't have someone to love and care for them even while receiving food and other necessities?"

"That can happen?" Riko asked Anzu.

"This is the first I've heard of it," Anzu replied.

"Anyway, once Rozaniela was at a stable population, our remaining ancestors made a decision: to put away all of their limitless powers so nobody can hate each other or use them for evil purposes. That's when they created the Energia as a container for their powers. Then they sealed it within the core of the planet, because no being would ever think to go down there. They then set up lots of security systems as a precaution, and the first layer of access is just below my castle. I have a special squadron of royal security guards made just for guarding the Energia's layers of security systems. Because the Energia contains limitless power and energy, it would be perilous if it got into the wrong hands. That's why our ancestors were so dead set on sealing it someplace where nobody could access it no matter how hard they tried," Malgorzata elaborated further.

"What do the Pretty Cure have to do with this whole thing?" Kyoya asked, clutching Lovebeam.

"I don't remember exactly, but some of those ancestors created the Heart Lighters as another safety precaution. As far as I can tell, there were exactly eight Heart Lighters in existence, four of which you girls already have, Two are broken and another two are missing," Malgorzata replied. The girls all looked at their Heart Lighters with wonder. "For reasons I still don't understand, the Heart Lighters only work on young females who have strong resolves and kind hearts. I know this because I personally rescued and raised two young Pretty Cure candidates."

"There were Pretty Cure before us?!" Anzu yelped cheerfully. "What were they like? Who were they?"

"They were two young girls who I found in Japan many years ago, miserable and suffering. Nozawa Youko and Akai Hinata, aka Cures Sunlight and Daylight. They became friends the minute they met, and were thick as thieves. It was when they grew into teenagers that we learned about the Pretty Cure. Two of the Heart Lighers resonated with them when disaster struck once, and they managed to defeat the person responsible for it. I don't know the entire story, as much of it took place on Earth, and they went back to live there once it was over. I don't know what became of them, but I can only hope that they're doing well."

"I'd love to meet them," Hotaru said.

"Me too!" Marina piped in.

"Moonbeam said that the King and other people rescued Zenjin from an abusive home, right?" Riko asked.

Malgorzata grimly nodded. "Yes. One of my subjects went to Earth for inspiration for a novel when he passed by a house. He saw a woman cruelly abusing the poor child, sitting on him to the point of rendering him unable to breathe, yelling at his face, slapping him repeatedly, and degrading him in the worst ways possible. It was so bad he actually told my husband, King Ghislain, and some of his subjects about it. They raided the house, caught the woman in the act, and saved him."

Images flashed through Malgorzata's mind as she remembered that fateful day, seeing her husband with a gauze wrapped, battered bundle in his arms, rushing the poor thing to the hospital. She remembered the boy completely wrapped in gauze to the point where he looked like he was mummified, the oxygen mask duct taped to his face, the surgeons and doctors, Hornbeam among them, scurrying about to save his life, the heart monitors beeping like crazy, his fingers bent and contorted in odd, unnatural angles, huge black bruises on all of his visible skin. Worst of all, the boy's brown eyes were wide with absolutely nothing but naked fear.

"So...how did he take the Energia anyway? If that diamond's been sealed up deep into your planet, then how did he manage to get access to it?" Anzu asked.

"I know how!" Lovebeam piped in out of nowhere with one of her stubby little hands raised into the air like she's desperate to answer. "Decebal helped him out!"

"What?!" The kids and the Queen gasped with horror upon hearing this, the Queen even more so.

"How do you know?" Marina asked.

"Decebal used to work in King Ghislain's royal squadron, the ones responsible for guarding all of the security systems keeping the Energia safe! You can't be a member of the royal squadron without knowing everything about the Energia and the passwords to every single level in the system! Isn't that right, Queen?" Lovebeam explained.

Malgorzata facepalmed. "Decebal...so that's it…" Her face contorted sadly. "How could I have been so foolish?! We should never have rehired him after what happened!" Malgorzata exclaimed ruefully.

"So what's his deal?" Kyoya asked. "Lovebeam said something about him being fired at first, then you rehired him. Why is that?"

Malgorzata wiped some sweat off of her pale face with one of her bare hands. "Decebal was one of my husband's finest subjects. He's a well known actor for the Rozanielan Fairy Troupe which specializes in putting on plays and performances all over the planet. My husband adored him, and hired him when he asked to work for him to earn extra income. Decebal became my husband's most trusted confidant. At first, everything was fine until he began making radical claims about our way of running the planet. He accused me and my husband of brainwashing the citizens into thinking that there is no suffering and misery and that we're telling them that the world is always a nice and happy place. My husband fired him when he caught him beating a young woman for contradicting his claims and for wearing pants. But after a few months, he apologized and Ghislain hired him back," Malgorzata facepalmed again with a sigh. "He seemed so remorseful, too! To think he was plotting something all this time right under our noses and we didn't even see it! He completely took advantage of our generosity! Especially since he and his wife adopted Zenjin right after he got rehired!"

"Wait, what?!" The girls and Kyoya all yelped with surprise, in perfect unison.

"That sexist green haired guy is Zenjin's adoptive dad?!" Marina yelped in a loud voice.

"Yes. He and his wife Beileag offered to adopt Zenjin after we rescued him," Malgorzata explained again. "Zenjin never did adjust well to his new surroundings, but he seemed to be fond of Decebal and Beileag. But now...I think they were all in on the plot to steal the Energia. And that's where the story ends."

As soon as Riko heard Malgorzata say Zenjin was raised under Decebal's care, all kinds of thoughts began swirling in her head like a whirlpool. However, one stuck out like a sore thumb: did Decebal offer to raise Zenjin so he could fill his head with his radical ideas and plot Rozaniela's destruction? Or maybe even groom him into his personal pawn? It would explain why Zenjin's so disturbingly cocky, arrogant, and homicidal. But even she knew it was just as cruel to love someone for the wrong reasons, especially to turn them into bloodthirsty monsters and make them do stuff they're not supposed to.

"Queen. There's something you should know. Zenjin's been exposing people's Soul Portals, ripping out their souls, and turning them into black animal-shaped monsters. We gave them the moniker Corrupt Sentinels, but he calls them Human Trash," Hotaru explained calmly.

"I see," The Queen said, rubbing her chin with her hand. "Invading someone's Soul Portals, or privacy in general, is a serious offense here on Rozaniela. But I can't think of any reason why he'd want to, though. I know that Soul Portals can only be exposed by the Energia's energy."

"Do you even know why they wanted the Energia so bad? Do they want to take over the world or something?" Marina asked.

"Taking over the world is so cliché," Anzu piped in.

"I'm afraid we know absolutely nothing about their motives for stealing the Energia. All I know is that when Zenjin got his hands on it for the first time, he used it to wipe out most of the entire planet, as you can see. It was a test run to see what it was capable of," Malgorzata looked at what was left of her planet.

Some people were still scurrying to take injured people in makeshift stretchers and gurneys to the makeshift hospital. Others were still digging through piles of debris or calling out to people who were in need of rescue. Some firefighters were dousing a fire consumed house with all the water from their hoses. "Thankfully, the denizens of Rozaniela are working together to rebuild their home. I'm surprised at how determined and resilient they are."

"I kept telling you Decebal was bad news!" Lovebeam piped in loudly. Marina just shook her head like she saw something embarrassing.

"Thank you for telling us everything, Queen. We really appreciate it. Since we're Pretty Cure, we'll do our best to take back the Energia and do whatever it takes to stop whatever it is Zenjin, Decebal, and whoever else he is allied with are planning," Hotaru told her kindly. The fairies, Kyoya, and the girls nodded.

"I'm very grateful for your kindness, even though I wish you wouldn't be involved in the first place. You girls are so young and full of hopes and dreams. But this situation is dangerous, and you may find yourselves at the edge of death. I don't want to burden you girls with such a heavy responsibility, especially since you have friends, parents, and loved ones whose lives are in just as much danger as your own," Malgorzata told them with a soft but somewhat sad smile. "But I can help out too, if you wish. I may look like an elegant lady, but I'm very well known for my jousting skills and naginata wielding prowess."

"Oh! I practice the naginata, too!" Hotaru exclaimed excitedly, her blue eyes sparkling with enthusiasm.

Malgorzata chuckled. "How wonderful it is to have mutual interests. Anyway, there is still much to be done in Rozaniela, and as it's queen, it is my duty to ensure the safety of my citizens and my planet. But if the situation calls for it, I'd be more than happy to help you girls out at any time."

"That'd be great," Kyoya said. "I can't help much, but I'll do what I can."

"This mission will not be easy. In fact, your lives will be put in jeopardy. Scratch that, not just your lives, but the lives of Earth's civilians as well. Are you willing to put your lives on the line for the preservation of two worlds, even if it means finding yourself knocking on death's door?" Queen Malgorzata asked solemnly as she stood up.

"I wouldn't say we're willing, but we've already been roped into this, so we'll at least try to stop Zenjin and his adoptive parents from hurting everyone or doing God knows what. You have our word," Marina told the somber queen solemnly as she made a military-esque salute. Everyone else nodded.

"Thank you all. By the way...you there," Malgorzata told them gratefully until she bent down a bit to get a better look at Riko, who proceeded to frightfully hide behind Kyoya's wheelchair. Marina groaned. "You're Tasogare-san, right? Will you be so kind as to come closer? I haven't gotten a good look at you."

Riko wanted to go back to Earth now. She continued to shyly hide behind Kyoya's wheelchair frightfully. Why is a Queen so interested in her? Riko really couldn't see why a queen of an entire planet would want to be interested in someone like her. She's just a commoner while the silver haired woman is a queen of an entire planet. Why would she be interested in her?

"It's okay. She's not bad," Kyoya whispered kindly.

"But she's a Queen! I'm not worthy to be in her presence!" Riko whispered back. All of a sudden, she found something gripping her arm and forcefully pulling her to her feet, in full view of the curious, beautiful, silver haired, Native American dressed queen. It was Marina.

"Come on! Talk to her! It's not that hard!" Marina demanded, but Riko pried her arm off and ran behind Kyoya's wheelchair again.

"Don't force her to do something she doesn't want to, Marina. If she doesn't want to, then don't make such a big deal out of it," Hotaru told her kindly but sternly.

"Yeah, but if someone wants to talk to her, then she has to at least acknowledge her! It's rude to just brush someone off, especially if it's a Queen of an entire planet!" Marina snapped.

"She's not trying to be rude. She's just shy. Those are two different things," Kyoya told her bluntly.

What they didn't know was that Riko actually did approach Malgorzata, who finally took notice when she saw the short haired girl shyly standing in front of her, looking down at the grass, averting all eye contact. Her hands were in front of her, bound together by her fingers, squeezing each other so hard they looked like they were about to go white. The Queen didn't have to look into Riko's eyes to figure out that she was clearly anxious and shy. It didn't help that she was standing in a bit of an awkward and rigid way. But she paid it no mind. She kneeled down to Riko's level.

"My, you're quite cute," Malgorzata said.

Riko shook her head violently. "No I'm not," She muttered in a low voice.

"Look at someone when they talk to you, and you're supposed to say thank you when someone compliments you!" Marina yelled.

'_I know that!'_ Riko yelled in her head, and she wanted to yell it out loud, but Kyoya already beat her to it.

"Will you calm down?! You're making it sound like she's being a brat! She's probably just shy! It's not every day we commoners get to meet a real life queen!" Kyoya shouted back, not happy with the way Marina is interpreting Riko's shyness. He remembered Saki telling him about Riko's autism. He made a mental note to tell Marina about autism someday. She was going to need it if she wanted to be Riko's friend.

"I don't mind," Malgorzata said. "Anyway, I'm sorry you have to be involved in this mess. But I hope you'll do the best you can. I'm sure you'll be a fine Pretty Cure."

"Thanks, your royal majesty," Riko muttered dubiously.

"Please, call me Queen or Mal," Malgorzata said.

"No! My mom says it's rude and inappropriate to call a grown up by their first name!" Riko exclaimed, louder this time, with a worried look on her face, like she said something she shouldn't have. Marina facepalmed.

"We have to get going now. Thank you for telling us everything," Hotaru said.

"Not a problem," Malgorzata told her kindly, then looked at the fairies. "I'd arrange for you to see your parents, but they're awfully busy at this time."

"It's okay, Queen. We're just happy you and everyone else are okay," Starbeam said.

"Umm...before we leave, is it okay if I hang around here for a while?" Moonbeam asked shyly.

"How come?" Sunbeam asked.

"I want to see if one of my friends is okay," Moonbeam replied sheepishly, her cheeks turning pink.

"Which one?" Starbeam asked. Moonbeam flitted over to her and whispered in her ear. "Okay then. I understand."

"You all go on ahead. I'll catch up to you later," Moonbeam told them.

"But how will you be able to get back to Earth?" Kyoya asked, confused.

"The spell can be done individually, so it's okay," Moonbeam replied reassuringly.

"Okay then. Let us know when you get back, okay?" Lovebeam said. Moonbeam nodded.

The Queen said goodbye to her sisters and the kids as they cast the spell, opening the portal and sucking them all in, taking them back to Earth sans Moonbeam. The purple bunny fairy flitted away to look around for the friend she was worrying about. She didn't know how far she flew, but the further she flew, the more rubble and destroyed homes she came across. People were still digging through debris looking for survivors. Others were on their knees, wailing passionately over the corpses of their loved ones, covered with plain white sheets. Moonbeam didn't like the sight of the covered corpses and people crying, so she looked away. She hoped in her heart that her friend hadn't met that fate.

Soon, she came across a small school building. A one storied, brick building with a silver roof, very diminutive, and yet it was still standing. Moonbeam read the sign in front of it: _Fairy School #6, Elementary Divison_. She couldn't believe it. Her school was still standing! She thought it had been destroyed, but now that it was still here, maybe...Moonbeam found a glimmer of hope rising in her heart.

She decided to go inside. The inside of the school was heavily occupied by both humans and fairies of her own size. She could see humans giving away free bowls of warm soup to both people and fairies, wrapped in thick wooly blankets. Others were dabbing injuries with medicine or alcohol.

One particular fairy happened to be wrapping gauze around an injured child's arm. The fairy was a very pale green color, with pointed ears that have dark blue tips on them. The fairy's eyes were a rich, chocolate brown color, he was wearing a dark purple cape, his tail was pale green with dark blue stripes with a dark blue point at the end, the tips of his arms and legs were dark blue, and he had a huge, blue diamond shaped mark on top of his head. As soon as Moonbeam laid her sterling silver eyes on the fairy, they sparkled with delight, and she found herself fluttering toward him in a frenzy.

"Patch!" Moonbeam called out. The green fairy with the purple cape, Patch, turned around to find Moonbeam flying toward him.

"Moonbeam! You're okay!" As soon as he finished wrapping the child's wound with gauze, he flitted over to the purple bunny fairy and glomped her. As soon as they made contact, they danced and frolicked in the air happily, relieved to finally be able to see each other.

"I'm so glad you're okay! I was worried something bad might have happened to you!" Patch exclaimed in a sweet, boyish sounding voice.

"I could say the same to you! I'm sorry I haven't been able to contact you with the ComLap," Moonbeam told her dear friend gratefully. Some tears appeared at the corners of her eyes, but she ignored them.

"That's okay. Things have been pretty hectic around here anyway, so even if we could communicate with the ComLap or our walkie talkies, I'd be too busy to tell you much. By the way, where have you been since the incident?" Patch told her while patting some dust out of his cape.

"Get this! My sisters and I are on Earth, and we found the warriors who can stop Zenjin! Pretty Cure!" Moonbeam told him enthusiastically.

"What?! No way!"

"It's true! I'd introduce you to them, but they all went back home. I just wanted to check and see if you're alright."

"I'm fine. Flicker and Mimosa are too! Unfortunately…" Patch's ears drooped downward, and he became downcast. To Moonbeam, this meant something terrible happened to someone. But what? And to who? A dark shadow of despair already hung over most of the planet.

"What happened?" Moonbeam asked with concern peppering her sweet voice.

"Mimosa's mom and baby sisters are all dead," Patch muttered grimly. Moonbeam's sterling silver eyes grew wide in a millisecond, and her hands flew to her mouth, but an audible gasp could be heard regardless. "Flicker's dad died, too, along with SugarBelle, TrixieBelle, and Puff."

"That's awful!" Moonbeam yelped, unable to comprehend what Patch just told her. Her friends' loved ones are dead, along with three of their classmates! Moonbeam could picture their sweet, tender hearted, flower loving friend hearing the awful news, bursting into loud but grim wails, and probably latching onto whoever was within her vicinity, probably Flicker, who would cry with her. But knowing Flicker, he'd hide his grief and just help out with whatever's needed until he found a private place to cry out his woes all by himself. Even though he was usually show-offy and slightly full of himself, he always thought about others when the situation called for it, even at the expense of letting himself rest and just be sad. "Where are they now?"

"Not here. Mimosa's with her dad down south, and Flicker and his mom are staying with his aunt for the time being," Patch told her sadly.

Moonbeam's ears drooped downward, just like Patch's. Her heart became a sea of sorrow, yearning to offer at least some comfort to her grief-stricken friends. "I see. I'd love to visit them right now, but they're probably far away, and I don't have their contact information."

"I could get it for you. I'm actually planning on visiting them some time in the next few weeks, so I can give you the info via ComLap and if you're free, you can talk to them or even stop by," Patch told her reassuringly.

"Thank you, Patch. You don't know how much I appreciate your generosity," Moonbeam told him gratefully, which made him chuckle a bit and rub one of his ears.

"Aw, shucks, it's nothing, really. I've kinda been all over the place digging in broken houses, helping with the rescue efforts, giving clothes from the Ladies' Aid Society to whoever needs them, all that stuff. But your job is probably much harder, making sure whoever did all of this doesn't cause any trouble, so I totally understand."

"I know who did all of this. Do you remember that boy Zenjin?"

"Yeah! I do! Didn't Sunbeam want to be his friend?"

Moonbeam told him everything that happened. Grinding his teeth with rage, Patch punched the air.

"Why that ungrateful, no good-! If I ever see him, I'm gonna sock him so hard in the mouth it'd wake up his dentist!" Patch found himself exploding with rage, albeit to a mild degree for the sake of the injured and sick people taking refuge in the school.

"Believe me, you're not the only one who wants to," Moonbeam said, agreeing with him, even though she prefers not starting any fights. But the memory of that day and Sunbeam's tearful response to his cruelty was strong in her mind.

"Sunbeam even got in trouble for his sake! What did she do to deserve that?! She did everything for him yet he has the nerve to discard her like trash!" Patch yelled.

"I know, right?"

Patch took a deep breath and exhaled, calming himself and containing what was left of his rage. "Well, I'm at least glad you and your sisters are alright physically. I wish I could go to Earth with you and comfort Sunbeam. But things are busy right now, and my parents and I have a lot to do, so...tell her and the others I said hi. Okay?"

"I will. Tell Mimosa, Flicker, and the others we say hi, too," Moonbeam said before embracing Patch in a warm, loving hug. Without any hesitation, Patch hugged her back, hoping to have comforted her somewhat.

"You take care. Okay?"

"I will. Try not to push yourself too hard to the point of getting sick. I know you have a tendency to do that."

"I don't do it that much."

"Okay then. Bye, Patch!"

"Bye, Moonbeam! If I see your parents I'll tell them you're okay!"

With that, Moonbeam waved goodbye to her friend, flew out of the school, cast the portal opening spell, and returned to Earth, where hoping her sisters and the kids were waiting for her. In her heart, she wished she could have seen her parents, but knowing they're alive was a big enough relief, so maybe next time.

* * *

In another part of Japan, on a particularly beautiful sandy beach with soft, white sand, albeit scorching hot to the touch, the ocean sparkling underneath the afternoon sunshine, and gorgeous, cloudless skies overhead, Beileag sat on a long beach bench, allowing her skin to drink up some of the sun's rays. She was wearing a pretty, petite, dark green one piece bathing suit with some white and pale blue ruffles on various parts of it, along with a pair of pink sunglasses where both lenses were shaped like hearts. Her indigo hair was still kept in her favorite long pig tails with green scrunchies. She was lying on her pink and yellow beach bench, drinking a strawberry smoothie through a straw.

"Gathering information is harder than I thought. I couldn't find anything all day! Oh well. At least soaking up some sunshine will take my stress away a little bit. But seriously, I really don't know how these Earthlings can survive being surrounded by those tall buildings and bustling around in groups and all that stuff. Plus they're so obsessed with their cell phones and technology and everything!" Beileag mused to herself before drinking more of her strawberry smoothie. "All these people do is stare at screens, even on the go! I'm surprised they haven't gone blind by now."

Once she finished her smoothie, she put the empty cup down next to her and sat back into her beach bench and folded her hands behind her head. "It's so easy for people to forget the more important things in life, like soaking up some sunshine, looking beautiful, and-"

"Gathering much needed info!"

"GYAK!" Beileag yelped the minute she heard that familiar, squeaky voice. She leaped out of her beach bench to find a very annoyed Zenjin, complete with a flushed red face and snot dangling from his nose, eyeing her with a disappointed look. "Zenjin?! Shouldn't you be in your fortress?! You'll get sick if you're outside!"

"I'm bored to death! Plus I figured you'd slack off and be the usual featherbrained idiot you are! Why aren't you out there yanking out people's souls and getting info?! Do I have to bash your cranium in for you to understand? Because I will NOT tolerate incompetence, and you're incompetent regardless!"

"Look, you, I've been trying to look for information for four hours straight! I've only been here for the past half hour anyway! You don't have to make a big deal out of everything I do, y'know! And for the record, I am NOT incompetent! I may love Decebal, but I don't like those sexist ideas you're getting from him! You'll never get a girlfriend if you keep acting the way you do!" Beileag yelled, completely unaware of the fact that Zenjin was staring at the ocean as though he was in a trance. Soon, Beileag got the message. "Hello?! Are you in Lala-land or something? Wake up!" Beileag snapped her fingers in front of him.

"The ocean."

"Yes, it's beautiful. I get that. Finally, you're coming to appreciate the beauty of-"

"No! The ocean! I went to a school that was near the ocean!" Zenjin exclaimed, louder this time.

"You did?"

"Yes. I never went there long, but it was near a beach."

"Do you remember the name of the school? What city the school was in?"

"No. I've forgotten a lot of things since Decebal rescued me."

"I'm not surprised. Good thing you remembered, since maybe once I'm done getting a tan, I can try finding the names of all the schools in Japan that are near a beach."

"Yes. That'd be great."

* * *

"Uuugh!" Marina groaned as she plopped onto her bed, scattering some slightly tattered and well used notebooks full of self written song lyrics onto the carpet on her floor. "I need to stop flipping out over the smallest things!" She said to herself, remembering earlier when she scolded Riko for being shy in front of Queen Malgorzata.

'_I really need to stop getting mad over stupid stuff. Why do I always keep yelling at Riko? She doesn't deserve that! She's not like everyone else, and that should be a good thing!'_ She thought before letting out an exasperated sigh. _'I shouldn't be so critical. After all, she's the first person to actually _not_ believe all that garbage about me growing up to be his clone just because I'm his daughter. I should be happy! Friends don't yell at each other or criticize them...'_ She thought as she continued to lay on her bed and stare at the ceiling listlessly.

She wished she could loosen up a little and not be so uptight about everything. She couldn't believe she thought Riko was being rude and arrogant when she was only shy and nervous about being around a queen, nothing else. Even Marina was shocked at how she acted. Since when did she care about people's behavior in public? And why does she always misinterpret what Riko does? Yeah, she found it rather weird that she talks so much about cartoons on a regular basis, flaps her hands like crazy whenever she's excited, sometimes says and does inappropriate things, and occasionally does something stupid, but it wasn't like she was hurting anyone.

In fact, during their fights with the Corrupt Sentinels, everything she did was out of a desire to help out, even though it occasionally went haywire at times. She looked like the kind of person who wouldn't hurt a fly, because if she were a truly bad person, she wouldn't have become a Pretty Cure at all. Marina sighed again and grabbed what appears to be a bright yellow stress ball made to look like a tennis ball. She squeezed it with all the strength she could muster in her hand.

"I'm going to have to work on being a better friend. I can't just go around yelling at people all the time, especially when they're trying to be nice and helpful. I'll ask Muroto-sensei at my next anger management class this Tuesday," Marina mused to herself.


	13. Friends Are The Best Confidants!

_**Warning: There's a flashback of a car accident, some petulant bullying, etc. Just letting you know!**_

* * *

Chapter 13: Everyone Has Secrets! Friends Are The Best Confidants!

"Hey, girls. Wanna come to my house tomorrow?" Kyoya asked out of the blue a few minutes after the crew came back from Rozaniela, Moonbeam about a few minutes afterward. Riko turned around with surprise as soon as she heard it, which isn't surprising, since it was so random.

"What brought that on?" Riko asked, confused.

"My physical therapist had to go out of town this weekend, so tomorrow's session is cancelled," Kyoya explained.

"I'd like to, but my parents work on the weekends. But I'll ask when I get home," Riko said.

"I'm not doing anything special, so I'll come," Anzu said.

"Same here," Marina said.

"Me too. I don't get to hang out with you all very often, so I might as well seize the opportunity in front of me," Hotaru piped in with a sweet smile.

"That'd be fun!" Sunbeam piped in.

Kyoya pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to Riko. "Here's my home address," Kyoya said as Riko gingerly look the paper. It read _62593 Tobe Avenue_ in slightly messy hand written hiragana. Some of the lead smeared on the paper a bit. "My house is a cobalt blue color with a grey roof and a wheelchair ramp built into the porch. I have some paper on me but I forgot to bring a pen."

"I have one. Here," Hotaru said, handing Kyoya a purple and silver ballpoint pen.

"Thanks!" Kyoya exclaimed happily as he yanked out a big piece of paper, tore it up into three pieces, and scribbled his home address on all three of them. Once he finished, he handed the pieces to Anzu, Hotaru, and Marina.

"Thanks," The three girls told him gratefully.

"Are we gonna play games over here?" Lovebeam asked.

"I have a Jenga box I can bring with me. I used to play it a lot with Niichan, but he's a lot busier now, so I usually just play with Rina, and she's no fun," Riko piped in.

"Jenga?! I love that game!" Moonbeam squealed happily.

"Me too!" Anzu piped in.

"Oh! I can bring my Nintendo DS and my Pokemon games too!" Riko exclaimed. "But again, I have to ask my parents if I can go or not."

"That's okay. Let me know when you get an answer, okay, Ri-chan?" Kyoya said with a smile. Riko nodded, hugged him, and walked all the way back home, followed by everyone else. Starbeam followed Riko home this time.

Riko didn't have trouble getting home from where she was. The park was reasonably close to her house, and she and Arinao went on a lot of walks heading there. Not only that, she had her own house key, which was a very deep shape of plum purple with white flower designs painted on it, with a cute little white Moomin cell phone charm dangling from it (yes, cell phone charms can be used as keychains. I checked). She put the key in the hole, turned it the way Saki taught her, and pushed the door open.

"I'm back-AHH!" Riko called out until she stepped on something plastic and fell on the floor with a big thud. "Owwww!" Riko cried out after she fell. She wasn't seriously hurt, but the front of her body throbbed after she struggled to pull herself up. She looked down at her foot and found a Barbie doll dressed in a pretty purple dress.

"Riko! Are you okay?!" Hikage yelped as he and Saki came to the front door, their faces covered with blankets of worry and concern. They found Riko sitting on the floor, holding the culprit in her hands.

"Yeah. I slipped on this," Riko showed them the Barbie doll as she looked in the living room to find Rina sitting on the living room floor with a plethora of Barbie and Ken dolls scattered all around her, lying face up, face down, and in many other positions. Small, doll sized dresses, shoes, toy animals, and a Barbie beetle car surrounded her. "Rina! You can't just leave your dolls all over the place! I just tripped on one of them!"

"Quit being so loud. I can do whatever I want," Rina piped in irritably, more concerned about whether the Barbie in her hand's hair is brushed than the fact that Riko tripped and could have been seriously hurt. Without waiting for Saki to scold her, Riko stood up and stomped over to Rina, angrily yanking the doll out of her hands. "Hey! That's mine!" Rina shouted.

"No! No, you CANNOT do whatever you want! Mom clearly said you can't just leave your toys all over the place, especially near the front door or other places where people could trip or get hurt, like I almost did! That in itself is dumb! It's a rule, and you broke it! Now pick up this mess and play in your room!" Riko scolded angrily, appalled by her sister's attitude.

"It's not my fault it's over there!" Rina yelled before crossing her arms.

"Yes it is! It's not always someone else's fault, y'know! Why can't you actually be responsible for once and do what you're told?!" Riko snapped angrily, her face turning beet red. She really had to wonder what made Rina so selfish, bratty, and spoiled with that attitude of hers.

"MOOOM! Riko's being mean to me!" Rina shouted in her highest voice possible, causing the already angry Riko to cover her ears in fright, not that it helped. This only made Riko's anger boil even more.

'_I am not, you little brat!'_ Riko yelled in her head.

"Rina. Pick up your toys and go to your room. You're grounded for a week, and as of now, you'll be in time out for ten minutes," Saki told her sternly, pointing to the stairs.

"But that's not fair!" Rina whined.

"Do you think it's fair that Riko could have gotten seriously hurt because you left your toys in places they're not supposed to be in? What if she fell and hit her head on the stairs? She could have cracked her skull open and she'd bleed to death," Saki asked sternly, not once losing her cool.

Knowing it was futile to contradict her mother, even though she oh so badly wanted to, Rina stood up and proceeded to pick up all of her Barbie toys. Once she finished, she took them all into her room and stayed there. Saki shed her angry face and set Riko down on a dining room chair to check if there are any bruises or lacerations on Riko's body.

"Does it hurt anywhere? Did you sprain your leg? Do you need any ice? I have some band aids in the cupboard somewhere," Saki said worriedly as Riko looked all over herself for any scratches or bruises. Other than her elbows, left knee, and palms being redder than usual from making sudden contact with the floor, nothing is open, bleeding, bruised, or anything.

"No. I'm good," Riko replied. Her anger didn't simmer much, but she was at least happy Saki scolded her. But the question was dying to come out, so she decided to ask. "Hey, Mom? Kyo-chan asked if I wanted to go to his house tomorrow," It never hurts to ask, right? But Riko didn't think Saki would say yes. Both Saki and Arinao work on the weekends. On different shifts during different times of the day, yes, but it's still work, and there's the rule about not having friends over when their parents aren't home, especially when they're alone in the house. Riko assumed Saki would say no and move on. Or even say _'we'll see,'_ which, to Riko, was usually a fancy, vague way of saying no, and that made her blood boil quite a lot, as Riko didn't like vague answers. "I know you have work tomorrow, so…"

"I don't see why not," Saki said as she put some coffee in the coffee maker on the counter.

"Huh?!" Riko yelped.

"Sure. Do you know his home address?"

"Yes…" Riko replied, not quite able to comprehend Saki's approval. Is she seriously allowing Riko to go to a friend's house on a day when both of her parents have to work? She handed Saki the paper with Kyoya's home address on it.

"I know where this is! Okay then. I'll drop you off at his house, but I'll have to pick you up by five because I have to make dinner and take a shower before work. Is that okay?" Saki said.

"Yaaaaaay! Thank you thank you thank you!" Riko squealed with delight as she hugged Saki once again and gave her a gratitude filled kiss on the cheek. "You're awesome, Mom! I love you!" When Riko was done squeezing her, she began jumping around the living room happily while flapping her hands up and down rapidly at the same time. Then she spun around a bit like a top before stopping and picking up the phone to call Kyoya.

"Kyo-chan? It's Riko! Mom said yes! What time do you want me to be there? My mom's usually up by eleven...is that okay? Sure! That'd be great! But Mom's gonna pick me up before five because she leaves for work at 6:30 PM and before that she's gotta make dinner. Sure! That's perfect! I'll see you tomorrow! Bye! Yaaaaay!" Once Riko hung up the phone, she cheered joyfully and was about to jump around the living room again until she stopped. "Ack! I better get my homework done so I don't have to worry about it! I'll do it right now!"

"Indoor voice," Saki told her, but Riko paid no heed as she rushed to her backpack to pull out her homework and whatever books she needs to work on it.

Upstairs, Rina could hear Riko's jumping around and cheering, and that made her grab one of her Barbie dolls and throw it at her dresser with a grunt. The poor Barbie doll bounced off of the dresser and onto the floor, causing one of it's arms to pop off. "Can't someone shut her up?! It's bad enough she does that whenever we go outside!" Rina exclaimed as she looked at her poor, dismembered Barbie doll. She then found herself lost in her mind. _'She's stupid and dumb! That's what she is! She'll be a weirdo forever, even when she grows up! But...why does she have friends and not me?'_ Rina thought as she buried her face in her hands.

* * *

"Hey Mom! I'm back!" Marina said out loud as she walked through the door, only to find her mom on the phone.

"Oh, thank you so much! I really appreciate this! Bye!" Marina's mom, Hatoko, said cheerfully as she pressed the END button on her phone and hung it up. Marina found herself frozen at the entrance. Her mom is actually cheerful? When was this? She hadn't seen Hatoko be cheerful in a very long time. This was quite unlike her. Hatoko continued to be cheerful and jovial even as she saw Marina at the entrance, her eyes and smile so bright and so infectious they were practically blinding.

"Mari-chan! Mari-chan! Mari-chan! I have great news! You're going to love it!" Hatoko exclaimed joyfully as she hopped in front of her flabbergasted daughter. "I got a promotion!"

"A...promo what?"

"A promotion! I'm being transferred to a higher position in my job! I'm getting a huge raise, too!" Hatoko explained cheerfully, her face glowing with joy, something that was quite alien to Marina. "You know how I always work two jobs so I can pay the bills and keep you fed and clothed? Well, this new position will offer me more money than what I usually make at both jobs combined! I'll be able to quit my second job! Best of all, they're giving me a paid vacation for an entire month starting this Monday! Paid! Can you believe it?!"

Although Marina was quite unable to comprehend Hatoko's cheerfulness and most of what she said, she managed to get the gist of it, and even she caught a little bit of her mother's exuberant joy. "Wow...that's so great, Mom!"

"I know, right?! I know you've been lonely because of my working two jobs, and I've always felt awful about it. But things will be easier now! Not only am I going into an easier position making more money than ever, I get to spend an entire month with you!"

Marina felt her heart go warm the minute she said that. An entire month to spend with her single mother. Oh, this promotion is a God send. Mother and daughter time. Marina had been dying to have this wish fulfilled for a long time. Marina trapped her overly exuberant mother in a tight embrace, stunning her into silence. But with a soft smile painting her radiant face, Hatoko hugged Marina back, stroking her back with her hand, her motherly heart aglow with happiness she never thought she could have. "I'm so happy for you, Mom. Congratulations," Marina muttered into her mother's chest. "I love you."

"I love you too, sweetie," Hatoko said. Marina released her from the embrace. No longer is Marina the typically sullen, brooding, moody girl from Riko's first day of school. A smile literally made Marina's face light up in a way she never thought she could accomplish before. "I have an idea! Since I'm on paid vacation for the entire month, is there anything you'd like to do together? Like go to the movies? A baseball game? A concert? I know you love concerts. You've been managing your behavior a lot better in school, and your grades have improved, so you deserve it."

"Jeez, Mom. One at a time. This is all so random I can't think straight!" Marina said with her hands up in the air like she was being arrested. Hatoko sighed and calmed down.

"Sorry. It's been so long since we've spent any real time together, and I know how hard it's been on you. I feel bad that we never get to spend any time together," Hatoko told her warmly.

"I know."

Marina didn't want to put a damper on Hatoko's newfound happiness. In fact, she's happy that Hatoko's happy. Hatoko hadn't been truly happy in a long time. But she deserved to be happy. Marina knew this for a fact. She knew her previous behavior at school never made Hatoko happy, and things were actually looking up now that she stopped being a bully and a jerk to people. She had friends now, friends who don't care about her family background, even though she was previously cruel to them in the past. There were lots of things Marina wanted to do, like go to a baseball game, a Blue Moon concert, or the movies.

However, Hatoko suddenly developed a solemn look. "There's something else."

"What is it?" Marina asked.

"I've been thinking about this for a while now, and...I think it might be time to see him."

"See who?" At first, Marina was confused until it dawned on her. Her face contorted and her golden eyes blazed with irritation. "No way! You're not seriously thinking about going to see him, are you?!"

"Marina-"

"Absolutely not!" Marina plopped on the couch, crossed her arms, and kept her angry expression.

"Marina. Listen. I know you don't want to, but don't you have things you want to say to him? Don't you want to know why he did what he did?"

"No, and I don't care! It's his fault everyone hates us!" Marina shouted. "Why would I want to go see someone who used his power to steal money from people to the point of making them poor as dirt?! And we're the ones taking the blame for it all thanks to the media blowing it up like crazy! I'm not seeing him and that's final!"

With a sad face, Hatoko sat down next to Marina. "You're right. He has done bad things. None of it is okay. I know things have been hard for us. However...sometimes we have to do things we don't want to because they're good for us. Some of us want closure. To know why he did what he did. I'm not saying we should forgive him. I'm saying we should at least hear what he has to say, then we can decide what to do from there."

Marina kept her arms crossed and didn't say a word. She knew her mother wanted answers, and there was nothing wrong with that. But Marina wanted nothing to do with her father. Anyone who makes a big mess and leaves his family members to clean it up and be everyone's scapegoats isn't worth squat. But then again, Marina had a lot of pent up anger in her that she was dying to let out. She could go just so she could call him out on everything and tell him that she's not going to take the fall for his crimes.

"Alright then. I'll go see him with you," Marina muttered irritably.

"I'm sorry. It's just...I can't keep living like this anymore. I don't want to run away anymore. We're going to face to face him eventually. Why not now? Maybe something good will come out of this."

"I know."

"I'll call the county jail tomorrow and see if I can arrange something," Hatoko said. "But for now...do you want to go out for dinner tonight? I know a good place that makes awesome steak! And they have a great dessert menu, too!"

Marina nodded without question. "Great idea!"

* * *

Sunday finally arrived. Saki dropped Riko off in front of the cobalt blue house with the grey roof that Kyoya described. The numbers on it sid 62593, and this was definitely Tobe Avenue. Saki stayed in the car, not wanting to leave until Riko went in safely. Riko trotted up the wheelchair ramp, which wasn't very high, and pressed her finger on the doorbell. _Bong bong_. It took a couple seconds, but Kyoya answered the door, and his face lit up when he saw Riko.

"Hey! Welcome to la casa de Mitomo!" Kyoya proclaimed cheerfully as he opened the front door wide and welcomed Riko inside. But she didn't go in right off.

"Your house isn't an umbrella(1)," Riko said.

"No no! See, the word I used is a Spanish word. The word casa, if you spell it with a C instead of a K, it becomes the Spanish word for house," Kyoya explained kindly.

"Ohhh! I see! Sorry about that."

"It's okay. I just wanted to-"

"Waah?!" Riko found something gently push her, but it felt a little hard and made her take a few steps away from the door.

She turned around to find something she never expected to see behind her. A tall, lean, big St. Bernard dog, almost as tall as she was, with moderately long, floppy dark brown ears, a white face with dark brown marks dotting it, a white body with lots of brown spots on it, skinny white legs, and a happily wagging brown and white tail going left and right at a rapid pace. It's face was extremely large, about the size of an old computer monitor, with small, innocent blue eyes. A green leash dangled from his matching collar.

"Where'd you come from?" Riko asked as Kyoya burst into a fit of merry laughter. Saki did as well.

"That's Hondo, my neighbor's dog. He's always running off and meeting new people. Don't worry. He's super sweet and friendly. I've walked him a few times," Kyoya said through his laughter. Riko looked down at the big St. Bernard, Hondo, who had a look in his eyes that said, _'I wanna play!'_

"In that case...you're so cute!" Riko chirped, her surprise dissipating, as she decided to put down her Jenga box and pet the big St. Bernard on his big head. The dog just sat there as Riko happily pet it, enjoying the love and affection he's receiving.

"Hondo! There you are, you big lug!" A woman exclaimed as she ran on the sidewalk and caught up to the big St. Bernard dog. She looks to be in her early sixties, with long graying brown hair streaming down to her shoulders, wearing a pink shirt and a pair of blue jeans.

"Is he yours?" Riko asked.

"Yes. Sorry about that. When he gets excited about something, I can't get a hold of him. He didn't scare you, did he?" The woman asked sheepishly.

"Not at all. He's adorable!" Riko chirped sweetly as she snuggled Hondo some more.

"Hi, Mukai-san! This is my best friend, Tasogare Riko," Kyoya introduced Riko to the lady, Mukai. Riko, suddenly realizing she's in front of someone, became rigid.

"Hi...it's...nice to...meet you…" Riko muttered like a robot. Hondo gently nudged her, which made her body relax.

"Is this the friend you've been telling me about? She's cute!" Mrs. Mukai said with a smile. Riko paid her no heed, as she continued to pet Hondo, who seemed to enjoy the attention. Saki drove away, leaving Riko and Kyoya with Mrs. Mukai and Hondo. Mrs. Mukai picked up Hondo's leash.

"We'd better get going now. It's nice to meet you, Riko-chan! Bye!" Mrs. Mukai said as she gently took Hondo's leash as they walked away.

"Bye, Hondo!" Riko cried out happily.

Riko and Kyoya walked inside, where they were greeted by Kayoko and Jiroemon, Kyoya's parents. Riko, while still a bit timid, wasn't as shy with them as she was when Kyoya was dropped off at her house when he came over. They first began by playing Pokemon together as a way to pass the time before Anzu, Marina, and Hotaru get here. Riko lost to Kyoya. Finally, the door bell rang again. Kyoya went to get it, and there he found Hotaru, Anzu, and Marina, with the fairies.

"Hey, Kyoya-kun!" Anzu piped in.

"Come on in!" Kyoya said as he invited them inside.

"Your house is cool," Marina piped in.

"It sure is," Sunbeam piped in, but with a whisper as she doesn't want Kayoko and Jiroemon to find out she's a talking fairy.

Hotaru introduced herself and everyone else to Kyoya's parents. Although they seemed surprised, they were happy that Kyoya has more friends. But Marina could tell from looking at Kayoko that she wasn't too keen on having her here. Marina didn't blame her, as she had good reason for giving her the stink eye. She had been mean to her kid for quite a few years now, so it wasn't likely she'd warm up to her, not that Marina ever expected her to from the beginning. But Marina does feel bad about it now.

Riko invited them to play Jenga, which they did, and had quite a bit of fun doing it. Sometimes, the Jenga game got pretty tense when anyone tried to pull out a little block without making the whole thing topple over. Marina would flip out and demand rematches whenever the blocks would scatter all over the place.

"Can I get you something to drink?" Jiroemon asked.

"I'm good," Riko said.

"Me too," Marina said.

"Can I have a glass of water, please?" Anzu asked.

"I notice you have some Snapple. May I ask for one of those?" Hotaru asked.

"Sure! Coming right up!" Jiroemon snapped his fingers with a smile as he grabbed a pink lemonade Snapple for Hotaru, then got a glass of water for Anzu.

"Thank you," Hotaru and Anzu told him politely.

Soon, once the kids finished their drinks, they went to Kyoya's room. Riko stayed behind to make sure Kyoya crawled up the steps without slipping or getting hurt. She couldn't help but be awestruck at how adept he was at doing it even when he says he's still unable to properly walk. He did say he practiced, and she had seen it before, so perhaps he's a lot stronger than she assumed. Once he was up there, she followed him to his room.

"Your room is nice, Kyo-chan," Riko said.

"Thanks," Kyoya replied as Sunbeam hopped on his shoulder.

"Hey, fairies? There's something I've been meaning to ask you all," Hotaru said.

"What might your question be, Hotaru-san?" Starbeam asked.

"The Queen mentioned that one of Zenjin's adoptive parents was someone named Beileag. Do you know who that is?" Hotaru asked.

"I've met her. She's Decebal's girlfriend and a fellow actress in his acting troupe. That's actually how they met. She tried out for his acting troupe and fell head over heels over him. But she's extremely flighty, clueless, clumsy, and a real ditz," Moonbeam explained.

"Like every pink haired main character of almost every Pretty Cure anime ever?" Anzu asked sarcastically.

"Pretty much. She also really likes shopping and fashion, like Lovebeam. In fact, just before Zenjin decimated the planet, Queen Malgorzata hired her to be her dress designer," Sunbeam piped in. "Oh, and she dresses like a hippie."

"You mean those hippies from the 1960s who protested stuff like the Vietnam War, drug use, nuclear weapons, and preached about peace and being nice to everyone of all genders and races?" Anzu asked again, not sarcastically this time.

"Sort of," Lovebeam piped in. "I love fashionistas and all, but her style of dress always turned me off. A little too flashy for my tastes. I do know she hates her real name for some reason and always wants people to call her B-chan or Billie,"

Anzu leaned against one of Kyoya's walls. _'I wonder what it's like to be a hippie? It's gotta be better than putting up with Mom and Dad yelling all the time,'_ Anzu thought to herself silently as she gripped her harmonica in her hand tightly.

"So since Zenjin has the jewel that can do anything and everything, we might have to find out exactly what he, Decebal, and whoever the heck this Beileag girl is, are planning to use it for," Hotaru explained.

"She's right. They could be up to something horrible, like taking over the world!" Kyoya said.

"Taking over the world is so cliché, and if he really wanted to do that, he would have done it by now," Anzu deadpanned.

"Good point," Kyoya said.

"Maybe he's planning revenge? Against the person who abused him," Hotaru pondered out loud.

"That seems pretty likely," Marina said. "If somebody beat me and treated me bad for years without end, I'd probably sic her, too."

"He never did get used to receiving actual love and affection from people. In fact, Zenjin doesn't like being touched in any way. He wouldn't let anybody near him except for Decebal. I tried to hug him once, but he pushed me off like he thought I was trying to eat him," Sunbeam piped in.

"I don't like being touched either, unless it's someone I love," Riko said. "I especially don't like it if their skin feels craggy and they smell bad and wear itchy clothes or they're all sweaty. Ugh!"

"But if he wants revenge, how come he hasn't found his abuser yet?" Marina asked.

"It has been a few years, so maybe she might have moved to a different place and he doesn't know about it. Plus, the Earth is a pretty big place, and Zenjin hasn't been here in a long time, so he won't know his way around," Lovebeam said.

"And what about his adoptive parents? Why are they helping him in all of this? Do they support his cause? Or do they have other motives?" Anzu asked, curious.

"I wish we knew. I only wish the Queen never handed Zenjin to them at all and just raised him herself, that way none of this would have happened," Lovebeam explained sadly, harboring guilt over not being able to provide everyone with the answers they want.

"Why couldn't she raise him herself?" Riko asked.

"She's a Queen! She reigns over an entire planet and shoulders a lot of other responsibilities, like maintaining the planet's peace and giving food, clothes, and love to her many denizens," Starbeam answered.

"Being royalty must suck if you can't do whatever you want," Kyoya said.

After that, the Pretty Cure discussion was adjourned, and they decided to do other things, like watch videos on YouTube (Marina was ecstatic about showing them videos about epic rap battles), read manga, play more Jenga, etc. Soon, Hotaru got a call from her parents telling her it's time to come home, so she left, followed by Anzu, leaving Marina, Riko, and Kyoya.

"I'm gonna go to the bathroom. Okay?" Marina said as she left the bedroom, leaving Riko and Kyoya alone. Don't worry, they're not going to do anything they're not supposed to. They're sitting next to each other, leaning against Kyoya's bed on the floor.

"I've never been invited to someone's house before. I've always dreamed of it, but I never thought it'd actually happen to me until now," Riko told him.

"Are you having fun?" Kyoya asked kindly.

"Of course I am! I haven't had this much fun in forever!"

Kyoya smiled. "Glad to hear it."

A thought wiggled into Riko's head, and she found it to be a good opportunity to release it. "Umm...I know I'm not supposed to ask about stuff like this, but...what was the accident like?"

"Do you mean the car accident?"

Riko nodded.

"Sure. It was about a year and a half ago. We were going up north to visit relatives," Kyoya began.

(flashback)

_Kyoya sat in the back seat of a silver BMW, playing his crimson red Nintendo DS quite contentedly while Jiroemon was at the wheel, and Kayoko was in the passenger seat, watching the scenery go by. Kyoya didn't care, as he was too engrossed in his game to really bother to watch the scenery around him, not even as the car suddenly began to act strange._

"_Something's off with the car," Kayoko said._

"_I'll pull over and see what it is," Jiroemon said as he pulled to a safe side of the road they're on and stopped the car. He walked out of the car and looked at his tires. They seemed fine until he looked at the one on the back of the car, on the left. "It's flat!"_

_Kayoko came out of the car to see what's up. "A flat tire? Really?"_

"_Yeah. See?" Jiroemon showed her the flat tire._

"_Oh my! I wonder what caused it!" Kayoko exclaimed._

"_I hope I packed an extra tire," Jiroemon said as he turned on the trunk and opened it. To his displeasure, there are only a few beach towels. No new tire in sight. "Stupid me. Oh well. I'll call AAA and see if they can help," Jiroemon walked past the front of the car as he pulled out his cell phone. Kayoko joined him while Kyoya sat in the back seat, continuing to play his game._

_Kayoko became uneasy upon noticing they were right on the edge of a cliff with roadside barriers overlooking it. The cliff seemed to go pretty steep, even though the bottom of the cliff was actually not too far down. But it certainly looked dangerous if someone crashed into them and knocked the car down there._

_Kyoya continued to play his game until his Nintendo DS slipped out of his hand and bounced under the passenger seat where Kayoko sat. "Aw man!" Kyoya removed his seat belt and kneeled down to try and grab his game._

_The sound of tires screeching against the road scented the air, but he was completely oblivious to it, not even as the sound got louder and louder. "Got it!"_

SCREEEEEEEEEEECH

_Before he could look, a green van suddenly swerved right at the corner, heading right toward them. Kyoya had absolutely no time to react, even as he was rejoicing in managing to get his Nintendo DS out from underneath the passenger seat._

CRASH!

_The green van hit their silver BMW so hard it broke the railing in half, and both cars went tumbling down the cliff until it stopped at the bottom of it. Jiroemon and Kayoko barely managed to miss it, but found themselves completely frozen with shock. What in the world just happened? They managed to unfreeze the minute they remembered Kyoya was still in the car. _

_But they were going to regret looking down that cliff. The green van and their silver BMW were both lying on the bottom of the cliff, smashed, decimated, and totaled, upside down. Broken glass was scattered all over the place. One of the car horns on the steering wheels was continuing to make a persistent _BEEEEEEEEEP_ sound. The side of the silver BMW that the green van smashed looked more like a broken accordion than a car._

"_No! NononononoNOOOO! KYOYAAA!" Kayoko wailed upon seeing the wreckage. Kyoya's in there! He could be trapped down there, possibly on the verge of death! If he died...Kayoko didn't want to think about it. Jiroemon embraced his hysterical wife and called 119, hoping someone would come and save their child from the doors of death._

_As for Kyoya, he didn't know what was going on. All he knew was that he felt something heavy on his legs and back. He couldn't move at all. When he woke up, he saw his red Nintendo DS lying in the grass in front of him, along with some broken glass. Some tiny shards of glass got into his arm. He tried to reach out for the Nintendo DS, but he didn't have his glasses, so his eyesight was completely blurry, not helped by the fact that his head was pulsating quite hard. It was a futile effort, and he fell unconscious. He didn't wake up, even as the ghostly songs of ambulance sirens and fire trucks echoed in the air._

(end flashback)

"That must have hurt," Moonbeam said.

"It did. I was in a coma for a couple days, and from what the doctors told me, I almost died. But I didn't," Kyoya told her, looking down at his bare feet with a slightly sad, spaced out look. "The police managed to catch the guy who almost killed me. Turns out, he was so drunk he couldn't even see right, and by drunk I mean he drank WAAAAY too much alcohol."

"Alcohol is evil! People should never drink that stuff before they drive! It messes up their brain and makes them evil!" Riko exclaimed, balling her hands into little fists.

"I know, right?" Kyoya said.

"So...were you sad when...they told you you couldn't walk anymore?" Riko asked softly.

"At first I was. But then they told me it could have been a lot worse, and if I undergo lots of physical therapy, I'll be able to walk again like normal!" Kyoya explained, his smile returning. "I've been practicing how to walk again since day one. In fact, I managed to regain feeling in my legs, crawl, and stand up straight within a whole year! It takes years just to do all of that!" Kyoya proclaimed cheerfully. Then he let out an embarrassed chuckle and scratched his head with his hand. "I still have trouble with actually walking, though."

"You've been through so much, yet you're so strong. I wish I was as strong and determined as you," The memory of seeing Kyoya fall down and get back up again in the nurse's office was strong in her mind. "I'm just a wimpy little crybaby who can't do anything right," Riko told him.

"You're not a wimp! You're awesome, and anyone who says otherwise has to deal with me! Oh! I have some scars from the accident! Wanna see?" Kyoya asked, and he didn't give Riko time to respond as he already pulled up the back of his shirt to reveal the scars on his back. They were all hard and pinkish red, some were small, one looked like a huge gash that didn't heal quite right. "You can touch them if you want!"

"No thanks. Those look like they hurt!" Riko said.

"They used to, but not anymore," Kyoya said as he pushed his shirt back down. He then looked at his ceiling with the same spaced out look again, like he's not really looking at the ceiling, but through it. "Y'know, you're the first person I've ever told about the accident."

"Really?"

"Yeah. I've been so focused on my therapy that I never got to talk to anyone anymore. All the friends I did have drifted away from me...until I met you. You're the first person who actually doesn't make a big deal out of the fact that I'm in a wheelchair or treat me like I need constant help with everything."

Riko wasn't sure how to respond to that. Her heart was suddenly aglow with a strange, warm feeling she recognized, but was never able to get used to. Moonbeam suddenly piped in, "There are lots of people in wheelchairs on Rozaniela, but seeing them is as normal as seeing birds flying around."

"By the way, I wonder what's taking Marina so long?" Kyoya asked as he looked at the door. Riko suddenly donned a mischievous smile.

Before he could do anything, Kyoya suddenly felt a soft and tender sensation dancing on his ribs, which suddenly made him burst into laughter. It didn't take long to find out it was Riko launching a tickle attack on him, sending him face down on the ground in an explosion of laughter on both sides.

"Hey! Cut it out, Riko!" Kyoya laughed as Riko launched her tickle assault on him. Soon, he got the upper hand by grabbing one of Riko's wrists and sending her to the floor. For someone who can barely walk, he sure is flexible and adept at getting himself out of a situation, even if it's merely a playful one. Then he noticed some of Riko's shirt got pulled up by the way it's rubbing against his floor, exposing a tiny bit of her slightly chubby abdomen. "Oh, you're in for it now!"

In playful retaliation, he launched his own tickle assault on her abdomen, and now Riko is the one bursting into merry laughter, trying helplessly to get this red-headed, bespectacled kid off of her, but failing miserably...or happily, in this case. "Quit it, Kyo-chan!" She playfully pushed on him, but he refused to let up. Even he was laughing at how silly and helpless Riko looked under his clutches. Moonbeam simply stood there watching, not quite sure what to do.

Normally, Riko didn't like being tickled. With others, she didn't like it because they were being forceful and just wanted to tease her for their own pleasure without thought of how she'd feel. But she noticed she felt different this time. She...liked it. For one thing, Kyoya's hands weren't hard, cracked, sweaty, craggy, sticky, or any of those unpleasant feelings she hated, and she normally didn't like being touched by people at all. But his tender fingers playfully dancing on her skin and successfully getting some cute giggles out of her felt surprisingly good.

Even though she told him to stop, mostly out of habit, she actually wanted it to continue on for as long as humanly possible. In short, she loved the feeling of having him tickle her and his fingers dancing on her fragile skin. She relished and found some solace in it all. She felt something warm, soft, gentle, and kind, like some warm and sublime light was pouring out of his fingers and dissipating into her body, filling her with kindness and telling her _'Don't cry. It'll be okay. I'm here.'_ She didn't feel this with other people as they tickled her in the past. This time, Riko felt it, and she absolutely loved it. She wished that this would go on. Forever.

Right after Marina left the bedroom, she trotted into the kitchen to get some orange juice, only to stop upon seeing Kayoko in the kitchen making some coffee. Marina felt herself go rigid upon seeing her, remembering the time she yelled at her when Marina came to Riko's house to hang out. "Hi," Marina told her shyly.

"Hello. Are you having fun?" Kayoko asked cautiously, looking like she still has some doubts. Marina couldn't blame her.

"I am. Look, I...I'm sorry for everything I've done to your kid," Marina said apologetically, with a bow to go with it. "I've been through some hard times, and people were always mean to me, so...I figured the only way to cope was to be mean to them back. I'm not trying to justify what I've done, and you're right in that Kyoya didn't deserve any of the insults I threw at him. You don't have to forgive me. I don't really deserve it. I...just wanted to say sorry…"

Marina expected Kayoko to flip out and wail on her, like she attempted to back at Riko's house. But surprisingly enough, she didn't. "Thank you for being honest with me and for reflecting on your actions. You, Kyoya, and the others are getting along so nicely. I'm glad. So...I accept your apology."

Marina smiled. An awkward silence appeared between them until Marina broke it sheepishly. "My dad...was a politician who was arrested for grand embezzlement. You've heard of Asagi Shouji, right?"

"Yes, I have. The case was all over the news. Everybody talked about it."

"I'm his kid, and everybody thinks I'm gonna grow up to be like him. They never listened to me when I tried to convince them I'm nothing like him and won't ever be. I pretty much gave up. But...now things are different now. My mother's gone to great lengths to take care of me, and I feel bad whenever I make her sad. I...I want to be a good person so she won't have to be sad all the time."

"I see. You seem to care about your mother a lot, and she cares about you."

"Yes, she does. Don't blame her for stuff I do. She doesn't deserve that."

"I'd never do something that stupid. But I'm glad that now you realize your actions have consequences for both yourself and the people around you. I'd be more than happy to help you with whatever it is you need help with, but try not to...let your anger get the better of you. Okay?"

"I'm working on that. Thanks."

The sound of merry laughter coming from upstairs crushed the awkwardness of the silence that came afterward. "Kyo-chan and Riko-chan must be having fun," Kayoko said.

"Yeah. They're really close," Marina told her softly.

Later on, Saki came back to pick Riko up, as it was almost 4:30. Riko said goodbye to Kyoya and his family and went home for the day. So did Marina.

* * *

"Dad?" Hotaru asked Sojiro after dinner.

"Hm? What is it, Hotaru?" Sojiro asked as he sat down on the dinner table to read the paper.

"I've been meaning to ask this for a while, but I...I never got around to it…" Hotaru said shyly, unsure of whether she should ask or not.

"Go ahead. I'm all ears," Sojiro said with a smile.

'_No. I've come this far. I can't miss this opportunity. Come on, Hotaru! Just say it! It's not that hard!'_ Hotaru told herself in her mind. Finally, she blurted it out. "Do...Do I have a mother?"

The question left Sojiro silent with surprise. He gently put down the newspaper. Hotaru gasped a little, thinking she might have pressed a button she shouldn't have. _'Oh no! I knew I shouldn't have asked after all! Is he angry?'_ Hotaru thought. She wanted to tell him never mind, but he smiled somewhat sadly.

"I was wondering when you'd finally ask that question," Sojiro said.

"Huh? You're...not offended?" Hotaru asked, flabbergasted, her ocean blue eyes wide like saucers.

"Not at all. But let's do it in the living room. Shall we?" Sojiro said as he got up and ambled into the living room. Hotaru did the same. They both sat down on the couch in front of their flat screen TV, which is off.

"We don't know who your mother is," Sojiro began. "We adopted you when you were a baby. But the agency told us that your mother was a very sweet and kind young woman. However, she wasn't fit to care for a child, and knew you deserved better, so she gave you to the agency so they could give you to someone who could really provide for you."

"Was she poor?" Hotaru asked.

"Not poor, but she hit it off with a man far too early in life. That's about all we know. But don't think she hated you. I don't know the details, but she clearly loved you with all her heart, and was sad to give you up. I only wish it was an open adoption so we could have met her, gotten her contact information, and told her all about you. In fact, I would have liked to be friends with her."

Hotaru smiled. She figured Sojiro wouldn't know much about her mother, but she found herself happy that she cared about her enough to give her a chance at a good life, a life she likely couldn't have provided for her.

* * *

The weekend closed it's doors and the new week opened itself up. The school day went fine as usual. But after school, Saki had to take Riko and Rina to the store again for some obligatory food shopping, along with a trip to Kohls for some new clothes. Again, Rina was vocal in the fact that she was not keen on the idea, making up ridiculous excuses to make them stay home, all of them involving Riko. Saki and Riko paid her absolutely no heed.

They stopped at Kohls first to look at some clothes since spring is nearing it's end and summer is beginning to blossom it's way in. Rina was particularly awestruck by some new, trendy clothes and picked out anything she could yank off the shelf.

"Hey, Mom! Can I get this?" Rina asked as she pulled out a rather glittery and sparkly dress.

"No, Rina. It's too expensive."

"Can I get this shirt?"

"No, Rina. It's too big for you."

"What about this skirt?"

"Absolutely not! It's too short!"

All the while, they found lots of new clothes for Riko that not only fit great and were perfectly plain, but were at reasonable prices. Rina was miffed by the fact that all Riko got were plain shirts and shorts, no pretty dresses or skirts, plus the fact that they only have two things for Rina: a cherry colored dress and a lime green and white frilled skirt. "How come you don't buy any dresses or skirts? They'll make you normal!"

"I hate dresses and skirts!" Riko told her.

"Rina. Don't decide things for people. It's rude," Saki told her sternly.

"How come she gets a bunch of clothes and I don't?! They're not even pretty or normal clothes!" Rina complained.

"You always want stuff that's really expensive or too promiscuous for you," Riko said.

Rina doesn't know what promiscuous means, but regardless, the little girl screeched. "You always get what you want and not me! You're weird!" Rina shouted out loud, causing people to turn their heads and stare. Saki kneeled down and put a finger to her own mouth.

"Shhh! Don't start!" Saki shushed.

"They're staring because Riko doesn't wanna buy stuff that'll make her normal!" Rina protested.

They paid for the clothes, went to the car, and drove to the food store. Rina decided to keep quiet this time, as they're here for food and other necessities, nothing else. However, whenever they would go down some aisles, they would see a mother and three little kids, all between the ages of three and five, pacing down the aisles, with bags under her eyes, either bouncing a crying kid in her hands or facepalming and letting out very exhausted sounding sighs. Two of her kids always cried no matter what, and Riko always covered her ears.

"Don't cover your ears! It's weird! Get over it!" Rina hissed.

"Rina. Stop it," Saki hissed back, causing Rina to cross her arms. But then again, even she found the screechy sound of the children crying to be irritating.

Although Rina stopped complaining, Riko didn't stop covering her ears, because the kids just wouldn't stop being little brats. When they finally got into a line, they saw the scraggly-haired, hunched looking woman pick up a box of cereal and put it in the rusty shopping cart, only for one of the kids to take it out and put it back. "No!" The woman said as she took the cereal box and put it back in. But the kid took it back out just as quickly. "No! Stop it!"

"No! I want candy!" The kid argued as she tried to yank the cereal box out of her thin hands. It was like they were in a game of tug and war. One kid, who sat in the shopping cart, suddenly began ripping a bag of coffee and spilled coffee powder all over the place. The mother gasped, but the kid she's tugging the cereal box from managed to win, only to rip the box and have cereal spilled all over the place. The little girl suddenly began screeching at the top of her lungs. The kid in the shopping cart began crying while throwing things at the mother. Another kid ran to a young boy and tried to take his toy away.

"Hey! That's mine!" The boy argued.

"No! Gimme! Mine!" The mother's other kid yelled as it tried to take away the boy's ninja turtle toy. The boy's mother managed to take the boy away, making the other kid start screaming and jumping up and down at the top of his lungs.

"Hey! Shut your brats up, will you?!" Someone yelled vehemently from a check out line.

Riko pressed her small hands tight against her ears, trying her hardest to block out the horrible sounds. The trio of children crying, various customers yelling, the mother trying to scold her children and make them stop their wild mischief, the many rusty shopping carts, squeaking shoes, all of the noise piled onto her ears like a Jenga tower just dying to topple over at the slightest nudge. Riko wanted to get away, but where could she run to? She couldn't just run out of the store. There were strangers out there, and she couldn't just leave Rina here. One of the store employees walked up to the woman with a very aggravated look on his face.

"You break it, you buy it!" The employee scolded as the mother put a hand on her daughter's arm, stopping her from causing more damage.

"Rina. Stay here," Saki whispered to Rina before bolting in between the mother and the choleric store employee.

"Don't yell. It'll just make things worse," Saki told the man calmly, then kneeled in front of the abject, drained mother and handed her two twenty dollar bills. "Here. This'll pay for the damaged items. Is that okay?"

One of her kids screeched again as he knocked some DVDs out of a stand, sending them clattering onto the floor. That did it for Riko. Unable to handle more noise, she bolted past the line and ran out of the store exit. Rina facepalmed.

"I can't take this!" The hunched, distressed mother of three exclaimed abjectly as she took all three of her kids by the arm and ran out of the store with them kicking and screaming like crazy. She left the shopping cart and everything else in it in the aisle, leaving Saki with the two forty dollar bills in her hands, her good gesture rejected.

"Stupid woman can't even discipline her own children right," One customer hissed. "My children know better than to be so vulgar and violent."

Saki suddenly stared daggers at her, her green eyes donning a disappointed glint. "I'm sure she's doing the best she can! It's not easy raising three kids, and you can't blame the parents for EVERYTHING that goes on! You should be happy she at least tried to keep them from doing any more damage! If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all!" Saki shouted, cowing the woman into silence.

As for the distressed woman, she dragged all of her kids into a maroon van, put them all in there, and then went inside herself. She sat on the drivers seat as a waterfall of tears poured out of her face, falling onto the seat fabric. She buried her face into her arms and the steering wheel. The children continued to scream and shout and cry and throw whatever insults they could think of at her.

"You're mean! I want candy NOW!"

"I want a ninja turtle toy!"

"Candy! Candy! Candy!"

The woman is so drained she's unable to muster the energy to tell them all to be quiet or even discipline them. All she could do is cry onto her steering wheel helplessly, just like she has for quite a long time, way past her wit's end. "I can't do this...I'm not fit to be a parent…"

As for Riko, she found a bench right outside the store and sat on it. It's still loud outside, but it's much better than listening to a bunch of bratty, crying kids screaming at the top of their lungs, wrecking everything, and causing whatever trouble they could make. It didn't take long for Saki and Rina to find her, with their stuff bagged and paid for.

"You okay, Riko? Sorry about that whole brouhaha," Saki told her kindly.

"It's okay," Riko muttered.

"You ruined everything! You need to stop covering your ears at everything! That's why people say you're weird!" Rina shouted louder than normal, completely missing the point about Riko's running out of the store. Riko was already at her wit's end.

"It's not my fault loud noise hurts my ears!" Riko shouted, appalled at the fact that Rina is accusing her of being the one causing the fiasco in the store just by covering her ears the whole time and running away from the noise. All she wanted to do was escape to a quiet place, not make the whole brouhaha worse.

"Yes it is! You're weird and stupid and you ruin everything by being so, just like you ruined my 5th birthday party! Why can't you be normal?! You wonder why everyone stares at us and yells at us!"

"Rina! Stop!" Saki scolded but she didn't listen.

"They weren't yelling at us! Just those annoying brats! Stop making everything out to be my fault!"

Now Saki is at her wit's end. "Alright! That is enough! We are going home, and I don't want to hear anymore of it!"

'_Why does Rina always blame me for everything, even stuff I don't even do?! Does she hate me that much?!'_ Riko yelled in her brain. She wished she was at Kyoya's house. At least they're nice and don't make a big deal out of every little thing she does. Some jealousy creeped into her heart. She wished she was an only child like her friends are. They don't have to put up with a little brat like Rina or the even brattier trio of kids that nearly wrecked the store.

But what Rina didn't know was that a kid her age and her dad walked right past them, whispering to each other.

"See, Daddy? She's the girl I told you about who's always mean to her big sister for no reason," The girl whispered. Rina was completely unaware of this, as she and Riko helped Saki put their food in the truck. After that, Saki drove Riko and Rina home. All three of them were mopey and angry, not unlike the mother and her three little kids.

As soon as Riko got into her room, she plopped onto her bed and screeched into her pillow. "UUUUUGH!"

"What happened to you?" Sunbeam asked with concern.

"It was awful! A bunch of kids all threw tantrums in the store and kept screaming the whole time we were in there! It was too much so I ran out to get away from it! But STUUUPID Rina yells at me right afterward about how I ruin everything because I cover my ears and 'cause I'm weird and how I make everybody stare and yell even though I wasn't even doing anything!" Riko yelled into her pillows.

"That must have sucked," Sunbeam said.

"Oh, it did! Ugh! Why does Rina hate me so much?! She always blames me for stuff and makes everything I do sound like a really big deal, even when I don't even do anything! It's not my fault I'm sensitive to loud noise!" Riko screeched into her pillows. Her blood was boiling and she wanted to cool down, but her anger continued to simmer. Feeling sad for the exhausted, annoyed girl, Sunbeam gently stroke her raven black hair with her paw, hoping this will calm her down a bit and make her feel somewhat better.

"Riko? Anzu-chan's on the phone," Saki said as she came into Riko's room and handed her the phone. Riko popped out of her pillows and took the phone. Sunbeam immediately went into stuffed animal mode.

"Hi An-chan. What's up?" Riko asked as Saki left the room.

"_Riko! You've gotta get here quick! That green haired guy's at it again! In front of the food store you go to!"_ Anzu exclaimed.

"What?!"

* * *

The distressed mother from before screamed and struggled as Decebal rummaged through her Soul Portal. Soon, he pulled his face out of it. "Hmph! Your suffering is so petty. Don't be so arrogant as to think you have it worse than anyone else!" Decebal said as he put his hand in her Soul Portal. The mother screamed louder as Decebal rummaged through her Soul Portal to yank out her soul.

"Stop this right now, you knave!" Riko's voiced boomed as her Twilight Ring managed to hit Decebal so hard he was sent flying onto someone's car, breaking the glass on the windshield. The wall the woman is strapped to disappeared. So did her Soul Portal. As soon as Decebal removed himself from the now broken car, the quartet of Pretty Cures and fairy sisters descended onto the scene.

"I am the light that will brighten up your world, Cure Twilight!"

"I am the lights that illuminate the darkness, Cure Starlight!"

"I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

"I am the light that will warm your heart, Cure Dusk!"

"We will banish the darkness with the light from our hearts! We are the luminous quartet! LuminousQ Pretty Cure!"

Cure Twilight turned to face the distressed mother. "Get as far away from here as you can! We'll handle things here!"

"Right. Thank you," The mother said worriedly as she scrambled to the van and drove away with her kids, still screaming like their lives were in danger.

Decebal drew out his rapier and pointed it at the girls. "You're going to pay for getting in my way!"

"Make us, loser!" Cure Dusk yelled as she tried to land some punches on the well dressed, green haired man, but he kept evading them. Dawn and Starlight tried to attack as well, but he punched them both, sending them flying onto some nearby cars, making some big marks on them. That gave Cure Twilight time to knock the rapier out of his hands and land a good kick on him, sending him through the store window. The fairies took the rapier and tried to fly away with it, but despite it's small, thin size, it turned out to be heavier than expected, and they wound up dropping it. Decebal flew out of the store and, with a strong punch, knocked Cure Twilight into a shopping cart.

"OW!" Cure Twilight yelped as she flew into a shopping cart.

"Dawn Slam!" Cure Dawn, with her glowing nunchucks, did some ninja moves and tried to slam Decebal with them, but he did some back flips, causing Anzu to unknowingly slam the concrete instead, causing a relatively small explosion that didn't do much damage.

"Starlight Kick!" Cure Starlight tried to kick Decebal, but he grabbed her foot, spun around, and sent her flying against another car.

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Cure Dusk shot a slew of flaming arrows at Decebal, who knocked them all away with his rapier. "God, he's strong!"

"The fact that you can't beat me at all proves that you are all just weak little girls. Just go home, play with your dolls, and be at the beck and calls of your husbands!" Decebal told them maliciously, pointing his razor sharp rapier at them with a smug smirk.

"Stop belittling our gender! Twilight Serenade!" Cure Twilight shot a beam of light at him, but he dodged it, and it wound up blowing up someone's black Mercedes Benz. "ACK! Sorry! I didn't mean to do that!"

"UUUGH! Dusk Medley!" With a loud screech, Cure Dusk shot flaming musical notes at Decebal, who knocked them all away with his rapier.

Decebal stood gracefully on top of a green van. "Don't think you're so special, you little weaklings," With a single snap of his glove covered fingers, black blobs suddenly appeared in mass numbers around them, all about their own size and height. They soon grew big, stubby, useless fingers and big, bloody red eyes.

"I don't need to waste anymore time on you. I have important business to attend to, so either accept you live for a life of servitude or die at the hands of my creations, the Transparent," Decebal said as he flew away.

"Ewww! They're so gross!" Cure Dawn whined.

"They look like black Hattifatteners," Cure Twilight said rather casually, completely unafraid of them.

"Are we gonna talk all day or give these things some beatdowns?!" Cure Dusk shouted as she cracked her knuckles.

"Sure! At least I have something I can take my anger out on!" Cure Twilight shouted this time.

"We'll help too!" The fairies exclaimed as they shot some beams of light at some Transparent, successful in making them disappear into thin air.

"Starlight Shower!"

"Mandarin Dusk Inferno!"

"Dawn Flame!"

"Twilight Serenade!"

The quartet of Pretty Cures and fairy sisters gave the myriad of black blobby things all the beatdowns they could give them. The Transparent disappeared into thin air as soon as the Pretty Cures or fairies landed their attacks on them, making them surprisingly easy to fight. But they're not only persistent, but there's a whole lot of them. One of them made a car explode.

"Ugh! Don't we have some kind of four Cure final attack or something we could use together?!" Cure Twilight complained, tired and exhausted.

"Oh! There is!" Lovebeam exclaimed. She and the fairy sisters whispered into their ears about the final attack they could come up with. The girls nodded.

"Lend us your power, holy light!" They all began by holding hands, and they all became consumed with a radiant white light, shining brightly like a camera flash. "Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!" As soon as they said it in perfect unison, the light blinded everything and everyone around them, causing all of the remaining Transparent to dissipate into the air, never to be seen again. The glow faded away, but the girls are surrounded by some destroyed cars and broken glass from the big window of the food store. Cure Twilight fell to her knees and exhaled a big sigh of relief.

"Yaaaay. We're done," Cure Twilight wailed softly. The cures and the fairies left the chaotic scene. Once they got far enough, they turned back to normal.

"It seems we went a little crazy this time," Hotaru said.

"Uuuugh! RIKO! Why'd you have to blow stuff up?!" Marina suddenly shouted. Couldn't Riko catch a break? She had been through enough yelling for one evening.

"I didn't do it on purpose! You saw how powerful Decebal is!" Riko shouted back.

"You could have killed people with those attacks of yours!"

"I was only trying to help!"

"Hey hey hey! Knock it off, you two!" Moonbeam edicted as she got in between the fiery Marina and the exhausted Riko. "Look! Nobody's dead, nobody's hurt, everything's fine for now! Okay? Sure, it was unfortunate that you did some damage, but it was inevitable! Besides, the fate of the world is at stake here, so broken cars and windows are the least of our problems!" She scolded.

"She's right. There's more at stake, so we have to work as a team and not yell at each other over this stuff," Hotaru told them.

"Let's just go home. We're all tired here, so let's get some rest," Anzu suggested.

"And do our homework. I hate math," Riko murmured.

* * *

"Zenjin? What's that song you keep whistling?" Beileag asked one day, dabbing her face with blush as she sat in front of a mirror on the floor, listening to Zenjin whistle a nice little song. He laid down on his bed as he whistled.

"I don't know. It's been in my head my whole life," Zenjin replied as he stopped to eat some warm chicken noodle soup, but snot still continued to dry on the skin underneath his nose. "Hey. I was wondering. How'd you and Decebal meet anyway?" He asked.

"Ohh! I'm glad you asked! It was the beginning of a super duper romantic encounter!" Beileag squealed happily like a romantic as she relayed to him the story of how she and Decebal met.

(flashback)

_Donning a beautiful, sparkling, cotton candy pink taffeta dress with clear, transparent chiffon sleeves, matching pink shoes, and pink hair decorations supporting her pig tails, a slightly younger Beileag stood on a stage underneath the spotlight, with Decebal and two other grown men watching from the seats. There are some auditions being held in order to recruit new actors and actresses for their theater troupe._

"_Who might you be, young lady?" Decebal asked politely, twiddling his glove covered finers._

"_Um...my name is Beileag, but I prefer Billie or B-chan. I'm going to recite a scene from one of my favorite Earthling books, Romeo and Juliet," Beileag told them with a slightly shy but cheerful smile. She couldn't mess this up. This was her chance to be part of the acting troupe, and they didn't hold auditions very often. With a sigh of encouragement, she began her audition._

"O Romeo, Romeo,

wherefore art thou Romeo?

Deny thy father and refuse thy name,

Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,

And I'll no longer be a Capulet."

_She went on and on, reciting the long line with lots of pseudo-woe and yearning, but very good pseudo-woe and yearning. The jaws of the judges dropped to the seats they're sitting on, their eyes wide like saucers. Beileag's soliloquy seemed to go on forever, but it only lasted for about a few short minutes. But to the judges, hearing this wonderful, dramatic soliloquy made them feel like they were listening to a Heavenly church choir. When Beileag stopped, Decebal suddenly stood on his Shakespearian looking shoes and clapped his hands wildly, giving a surprised Beileag a round of applause, followed by the other two judges._

"_Bravissimo! Bravissimo! You are truly one of a kind, little girl!" Decebal exalted Beileag with his loud clapping, which made Beileag's eyes sparkle with delight. She felt like she was going to explode from too much happiness. "You've passed! Please, join our troupe! We have lots of roles you would be absolutely perfect for!"_

"_Oh, thank you! Thank you so much! You have, like, no idea how much this means to me!" Beileag told him gratefully. She couldn't believe she passed the audition so quickly! Her cup of happiness was overflowing, and she felt as though she could fly into heaven right now._

_After that, Beileag took part in many of the troupe's performances. Many plays were from Earth, but there were a few Rozanielan ones, too. Beileag loved every moment of it. She got to be on stage! She got to perform in front of a live audience! She got to perform her favorite parts in her favorite plays! She got to be on stage with Decebal, even kiss him a few times during the romantic parts! Her flighty little heart was constantly aflutter, pounding whenever she would make contact with the regal, green haired man who always gave his best and most dramatic performances on stage. His deep, regal, booming voice, his elegant, classy style of dress, his physical beauty, the way his green hair would sparkle underneath the spotlight, the way he would just steal an entire play whenever he would come forth, etc._

"All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players.

They have their exits and their entrances,

And one man in his time plays many parts."

"_What's that from?" Beileag asked one day when they weren't performing. Decebal was in his dressing room, alone before Beileag came in._

"_It's the first four stanzas of a monologue that has Earthly origins. I happen to like the analogy it presents, the idea of the world being a stage and people of all ages being actors playing many parts," Decebal said as he looked at himself with a little compact mirror._

"_It sounds beautiful."_

"_It sure is, my darling," When he finished, he turned around to face her. "Sorry if this sounds like I'm prying, but tell me, my dear, is it true you have no place to live?"_

"_Uhh...well...I..." Beileag replied shyly, a little thrown off by her beloved colleague's question. True, she knew he meant no harm by it, but it was still a little random. But she decided to reply anyway. "My parents and I always wandered the planet, doing whatever we liked. It was fine, but I wanted to be in one place just to try out some things and find what I really liked. But when my parents found out I wanted to be a fashion designer or an actress, they said I'll be tied down and will never be truly free. But I feel free when I'm doing what I like, like acting and designing dresses! I did go to school for a while, but kids never liked me, and the ones that bothered to interact with me were simply using me to boost their popularity…"_

"_I see. You've had an interesting life. I do wonder what it's like to be a wandering vagabond…" Decebal said, listening intently._

"_It has its ups and downs, but I wanted to be in one place…a place where I can truly be myself and put my talents to good use," Beileag said._

"_I see. How about this? I recently moved into a house about a week ago. Would you like to move in with me?" Decebal asked kindly._

"_Wait...what?! Seriously?!" Beileag yelped in her loudest voice. Decebal is actually asking her to come live with him? Under the same roof as him? "I...I appreciate the offer, but won't people get the wrong idea? I don't want them to think-"_

"_It's fine. I have an extra room you can occupy, and I'll be sure to explain your situation to everyone, no strings attached," Decebal said with a smile._

_Beileag shrugged off her surprise and put both hands on her chest. "I...I don't know what to say...you've always been kind, but to think you'd do this much for me...I don't know if thank you will even do anything…" Beileag told him gratefully._

(end flashback)

"...and we've been together ever since!" Beileag finished, looking like she's dreaming about making love with Decebal. As soon as she finished her romantic tale, Zenjin sneezed again.

"Ugh. Your mushy-gushy love story is making me sicker than I already am!" Zenjin hissed as he grabbed a tissue and wiped the snot off his nose.

"Oh, bite your tongue!" Beileag snapped, appalled by his lack of appreciation for romance. "Surely, if you ever find the girl of your dreams, you'll understand what it's like to be swept off your feet by the tsunamis of LOVE!" Her eyes sparkled with stars and hearts.


	14. Broken Friendships and Battling Sisters!

_**WARNING: There's a scene of child abuse, minor violence, and slight use of an ableist term, even though the moral of this chapter is to not ditch a friend just because something happened to them to make them different.**_

* * *

Chapter 14: Broken Friendships and Battling Sisters! Can't Anyone Get Along?

On a bright and sunny Tuesday morning, Riko sat on her stuffed animal inhabited bed, reading yet another one of her Moomin books, _Tales From Moominvalley_. Starbeam was sleeping right next to her, also with one of Riko's Moomin books in her little hands, _Moominsummer Madness_. Riko had just worked on a huge part of her school project on cats. It was coming along quite nicely. When she stopped at the end of the chapter she's reading, she put a bookmark in her book and got herself ready for another day of school.

Riko looked around for Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina on the blacktop. There were too many children running around, chasing each other, or in their own cliques. Her friends were easy to pick out, but they didn't seem to be in the blacktop, so she checked the front of the school. There were a few kids, Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina being among them.

But something was amiss, as Fukiko was standing in front of Kyoya looking really sad and apologetic, while her favorite red haired, bespectacled friend looked at her with a very angry face, like he wanted her to just go away and leave him alone forever. Marina and Anzu were watching them talk with curious eyes. Becoming curious herself, Riko trotted over to the scene to see what was going on between them.

"Kyoya-kun...I'm sorry for everything I've done to you! Can we be friends again?" Fukiko asked with an apologetic bow, her voice trembling.

Riko found herself smiling. Fukiko took her advice and apologized to Kyoya! Riko didn't think she'd listen to her. But as happy she was about Fukiko finally taking action, Kyoya certainly didn't seem very happy about just having her be in his presence in the first place. In fact, he looked at her like she was the ugliest abomination he ever saw.

"Oh, NOW you apologize?!" Kyoya suddenly yelled out of nowhere, his eyes donning a cautious, ferocious glint. They had absolutely nothing but hate in them. "After leaving me in the dust when I needed you the most?! You sure have a lot of nerve for trying to make me fall for whatever you're trying to pull!"

"What?! I'm not trying to pull anything!" Fukiko protested. Some kids began to gather around them to see that the hubbub was all about. "I know I've been cruel to you and I'm sorry! I want us to be friends again!"

Kyoya wasn't buying it. Not one little bit. "NOW you want to be a friend?! Where were you when I was in the hospital?! Where were you when I was in a coma and almost died?! Where were you when I started my physical therapy?!" Fukiko couldn't answer him, because she knew he was right. She didn't visit him in the hospital or be there for him when he needed her the most. His questions pierced the armor she kept around herself for the past year and a half, and she was helpless to put the pieces back together.

Kyoya continued with his harangue. He didn't care if he was hurting Fukiko's feelings. In his mind, they deserved to be hurt. "Real friends visit their injured friends in the hospital! Real friends support them whenever possible! Real friends don't decide to discard them like trash because now they suddenly look different! You could have stayed with me when Daizo ditched me! You could have stood up to him, but noooo! You'd much rather be a stupid, shallow popular girl than an actual friend! Do you really believe just saying sorry is going to magically fix me and make me not paralyzed anymore?!"

"NO! That's not-" Fukiko tried to protest. She didn't want him to be fixed. He was still the same Kyoya as before. Fukiko finally realized it now, but Kyoya didn't believe it. She never did find out what hospital he went to, nor his physical therapy schedule, so how was she supposed to know all of that? Kyoya never did tell her about where he went after the accident.

Riko never saw this side of Kyoya before. He was usually so nice, mellow, friendly, and caring, even if he is rather blunt sometimes, and he's usually blunt for good reason. This new version of him was completely alien to her, and she found his newfound anger to be frightening.

"Face it, you idiot! You're not sorry at all! You just don't want to feel guilty and actually be a good person! Well, it's too late! You and Daizo made your opinion about me very clear. Now get out! You better get back to your girly girl clique! You don't want to be seen hanging out with the crippled kid, now do you?!" Kyoya shouted in his angriest voice possible.

With that, Kyoya wheeled away in a hissy fit, leaving Fukiko alone and heartbroken, in stunned silence, in the center of a circle of surprised kids. Fukiko tried, and she crashed and burned. She apologized, like Riko told her to, but what happened? He stomped on her heart, ripped it to pieces, and threw them into the breeze to be blown into the depths of oblivion, shocked and broken. He doesn't believe she's truly sorry for what she did. She fell to her knees. All of a sudden, her eyesight began to blur and she suddenly felt streams of warm water trickling down her cheeks.

Nobody bothered to help her up except for one girl with short, plump, pale brown hair and matching eyes. If Riko remembered correctly, she was sure the short haired girl's name is Takayama something. What was her first name again? It started with a Chi. Chinami? Chiko? Chika? Chikako? As soon as the girl helped her up, Fukiko croaked out some soft, high pitched whimpering at first, which soon evolved into full on bawling. Riko covered her ears, as Fukiko's frighteningly abject crying was too loud for her to bear. Right after that, the bell rang. Not wanting to listen to Fukiko's crying, Riko stormed into the classroom.

The school day seemed fine until math class came along. Not only were they learning new lessons that Riko can't seem to understand despite taking lots of notes, some naughty boys were talking and laughing during class and wouldn't stop even as Mr. Ikari scolded them. They finally stopped when Mr. Ikari raised his voice and screamed at them, prompting Riko to cover her ears just like earlier. But unlike with Fukiko, Mr. Ikari's yelling scared her even more, freezing her in place, so much so that she couldn't remove her hands from her ears to take more notes. She tried to remove her hands from her ears, but they felt like they were glued there, long after Mr. Ikari stopped yelling. All of a sudden, her own eyesight began to blur, and now she had warm water streaming down her cheeks, leaving dark spots on her notebook paper.

"Tasogare? Is something wrong?" Mr. Ikari asked as he stopped writing on the whiteboard, suddenly noticing Riko's tears. Some other kids turned around to look, some with concern, others out of confusion, others out of a malicious curiosity.

Out of nowhere, the girl who comforted Fukiko before suddenly raised her hand high into the air. "I can take her to Terada-sensei's office. Is that okay?"

"Sure. Go ahead, Chinami-san," Mr. Ikari told her. As soon as he gave permission, Riko hastily closed her notebook, stuffed it in her bag, and didn't even wait for the girl to accompany her before dashing out. Chinami-as it turns out-followed her right after taking a wooden hall pass off the wall.

The school counselor's office wasn't very far from the classroom. All it took was a couple doors to get to, and the office in itself wasn't very big. Just a little table with a few chairs, and a cubicle where Mrs. Terada does her work, along with a tiny crimson sofa, some bookshelves full of books, and other things. Mrs. Terada was a slightly plump woman with lightly tanned skin, freckles dotting her face, long, flat, stringy, pale blonde hair, and deep, chocolate brown eyes. Today she was wearing a simple blue dress and a pair of beige loafers.

"Hi, Terada-sensei!" Chinami called out, managing to get Mrs. Terada's attention.

"Hi, Chinami-chan. Is something wrong?" Mrs. Terada asked in a soft voice, immediately noticing Riko's contorted, wet face.

"Tasogare-san just started crying in class just a few minutes ago. I think it's because Yuji and his lackeys were being stupid and Ikari-sensei yelled at them," Chinami explained, wasting absolutely no details whatsoever.

"Too loud...I hate yelling…" Riko croaked, wasting no time sitting on the red sofa.

"I see. Thanks for bringing her here, Chinami-chan. You'd better get back to class," Mrs. Terada told her gratefully. The brown haired girl nodded and bolted back to the classroom, leaving a crying Riko and a concerned Mrs. Terada alone in the room. Mrs. Terada sat down on the sofa next to Riko. "You don't like it when people yell. Do you?"

Riko shook her head. "I hate it! It's too loud, and people did it all the time back in Yokosuka, kids and adults! Stupid Yuji just haaaad to talk during class! I wish he'd shut up and go away!"

"Ikari-sensei does tend to lose his temper when his buttons get pushed, but I'm sure he wasn't trying to scare you. Sometimes people resort to yelling when nothing else works, and I'm sure even he didn't want to go that far," Mrs. Terada told her kindly.

The two spent a lot of time together just talking. In fact, Mrs. Terada offered to let Riko eat her lunch in here instead of the cafeteria/auditorium so she could have more time to calm down on the condition that she makes sure not to leave any wrappers lying around. Riko drank her bottled water and consumed her peanut butter sandwich, fruit gummies, chocolate pudding, taiyaki, and chocolate chip cookies quietly and politely, and made sure to throw away whatever trash she left behind. But when recess came around, she found herself calm enough to go to recess. After explaining everything to her friends, they all decided to bring up what happened earlier this morning, much to Kyoya's chagrin.

"Kyo-chan? I'm not asking this to be mean or anything but...don't you think you were a little harsh? You really didn't have to yell so much or call her all those mean names," Riko asked as shyly and politely as she could muster. Kyoya shot an angry look at her.

"No. She deserved it after what she, Daizo, and everyone else did to me!" Kyoya snapped.

"Don't get me wrong. In a way, she did deserve some punishment for leaving you behind, and I'm not saying you're in the wrong. But maybe she actually does realize what she's done. Maybe she's serious about wanting to make up with you," Anzu suggested.

"She told me so. She did tell me she was sorry," Riko piped in, echoing Anzu's argument.

"No she's not! If she really was sorry, she would have said something long ago! You don't know her like I do!" Kyoya snapped again, his eyes getting their angry glint back. "She used to be my best friend. But she cares way more about fitting in and being a shallow popular girl than a friend!"

"Actually, I noticed she's staying more and more away from Ryoko and their gang," Marina piped in.

"It's true," Anzu agreed.

"Besides, better late than never, right?" Riko said. "Also, I don't think hurting her feelings and yelling was the best way to go about it-"

"So what?! Do I look like I care about whether her so called feelings are hurt?! For all I know she probably doesn't have any feelings anymore, and I know for a fact that she's not sorry about what she did at all!" Kyoya yelled louder this time, causing Riko to cover her ears. But this time she didn't resort to crying. "Just drop it! Okay?! I want nothing more to do with that whiny idiot!" After that, he wheeled away.

"Kyo-chan…" Riko stood there helplessly as Kyoya wheeled away from their group in a hissy fit.

In a way, she could relate to him. Riko had a lot of bad things done to her by kids and adults. They've done worse things than not be there for her when she needed them the most, and she wouldn't forgive them. How could she? But Fukiko was different. Riko wished she was there when he was left behind, so she could see the extent of their betrayal. If she didn't have feelings or feel guilty, she wouldn't have been sad upon getting brutally rejected. Not only that, Riko and Marina noticed that Fukiko was, in fact, trying to break away from Ryoko's catty clique. Riko wished she had some way to know if she was really sorry or not, but considering the fact that Fukiko broke down earlier, she had to be.

Kyoya, however, felt differently. All he did was sit in a part of the blacktop, sulking and staring at the scenery around him, without a care in the world. He was unable to forget the cruel betrayal. How could he forgive her when she went along with Daizo and his friends in believing that now that he's in a wheelchair, he's nothing but a permanent stain on their distinguished reputation in the school hierarchy? What gave them the right to discard him like trash when he's done so much for them? In his mind, he was right to yell at Fukiko and hurt her feelings. She deserved it! He had been dying to yell at her about it for a long while, and he felt nothing but happy about finally managing to do so. Serves her right! The bitter betrayal replayed in his mind.

(flashback)

_It had been about a week after he got released from the hospital. After so long, he was finally back in school, even though now he was in a wheelchair. An electric one, so he can get around on his own. He expected to be welcomed back with open arms, but nobody really cheered when he rolled into the classroom. They just stared at him like he was a strange, malformed thing in a circus. Kyoya didn't let this bother him, though. They're just not used to having people in wheelchairs around. He went about his day with a sunny face, even though he struggled to get around the many desks in the classrooms and the crowded hallways in between classes._

_However, things started to get sour when he tried to sit with Fukiko and Daizo at their usual lunch table in the cafeteria/auditorium. "Hey guys! Long time no see!" Kyoya waved to them cheerfully as he wheeled over to their lunch table. But he noticed that the chair he usually sits in is now occupied by Daizo's book bag, and nobody seemed to notice his arrival. He tried to sit with them by rolling into a space, but whenever he did, Daizo pulled his chair in front of him to keep him out. Some of Daizo's friends chuckled amongst themselves, which Kyoya found unsettling._

"_Umm...what's wrong?" Kyoya asked._

_Fukiko was about to say something until Daizo cut her off. "Things have changed."_

"_What do you mean? Where do I sit?"_

_"At a different table!"_

"_Why?"_

"_Just do it!"_

_Miffed at Daizo's sudden change, Kyoya wheeled away, his feelings hurt by his rejection. But he assumed it'd be a one time thing. He'd probably get used to it later on. They were best buds after all...or so Kyoya thought. _

_Whenever he'd approach them at recess, Daizo, Fukiko, and their other friends would run away or join someone else. Whenever Kyoya would attempt to join them, he'd be shut out completely. Whenever they'd get paired for projects, Daizo would loudly complain and wish he'd get lumped on someone else. Again, he assumed it was a one-time thing or that they were just playing around._

_But then it went on for another day. A whole week. Two weeks. Two whole weeks of being shunned and cast away by his friends. He grew more and more confused, sad, and angry. Why don't they want him around anymore, he kept asking himself. What did he do that was so bad? Was it because of his wheelchair? Have things changed that much since he's been away from school? Why are they acting like he's not worth it anymore? They used to do everything together and have fun. Now they're acting like he doesn't even exist!_

_Finally, after a third week, he couldn't take it anymore. He wheeled in front of Daizo, Fukiko, and their friends with an angry, contorted face that demanded answers. "Okay, WHAT is the big deal?! What's with you all?! Ever since I've come back you've ignored me and shut me out of everything like I'm some kind of weirdo! What did I do that was so bad?! What happened?!"_

"_What happened is that you're like that!" Daizo shouted, pointing to his wheelchair._

"_So? What's that got to do with anything?" Kyoya asked, flummoxed by Daizo's reasoning for their shunning him._

"_Can't you take a hint?! You can't hang out with us anymore! You're a cripple now!" Daizo shouted._

_If arrows could be shot out of people's mouths, Kyoya certainly felt some pierce his normally proud little heart, sparing nothing. Daizo's outright discarding him and cutting off their friendship just because Kyoya's in a wheelchair? This had to be a dream! "No I'm not!"_

"_Yes you are! You used to be cool! _Normal_, like us! Now you're a freak! A stupid, crippled freak who's gotta have people do everything for you! We're not friends with no cripple kids, man!" Daizo yelled maliciously, causing his male friends to laugh._

_Kyoya's eyes grew wider with every insult. "You're AGREEING with him?!" He cried out in desperation. "Dude, I was in a car accident! You think I wanted this?! My brain's still okay, just so you know!"_

"_So we all agree that this cripple kid's not one of us, right?" Daizo asked everyone. His male friends nodded._

_Except Fukiko, who looked conflicted over whether to take his side or Kyoya's. The red haired, bespectacled boy looked at her with desperation in his eyes. "Fukiko! You don't agree with him, do you?! Who cares if I'm in a wheelchair?! That shouldn't matter! You don't care what he says, right?!" Kyoya cried with a begging tone, his voice trembling with sorrow._

_Fukiko looked away from him with sad eyes. Kyoya pleaded that she disagree with Daizo. Out of all of their friends, she was always the nicest, the most understanding, the most compassionate. Surely she could fix this whole misunderstanding and call Daizo out on his stupid betrayal and preconceived notion! Surely she wouldn't betray him! Sadly, for Kyoya, his prayers went unanswered. Fukiko took a few steps back. Toward Daizo's gang._

_"Let's blow this popsicle stand," Daizo said as he and everyone else walked away._

_That did it for Kyoya. His friends-now ex-friends-have not only decided to abandon him in his time of need, but betray him by discarding him like trash all because he's in a wheelchair. What's the big deal about being in a wheelchair? He just can't walk anymore. It's not like he's brain dead or anything. Why would they do this to him? Kyoya's heart suddenly boiled with a combination of both anger and bitterness. He wheeled away, leaving them to their social circle. _

_Without him in it._

_At night, when he went to bed, he couldn't go to sleep right off. His mind was haunted by Daizo's treachery, Fukiko's betrayal, and everything else. He clutched his pillow tightly with his hand, wishing he could just beat the stuffing out of it. He sat up, grabbed the pillow, and threw it across the room, knocking his Nintendo DS off of his bureau and onto the floor._

_Kyoya's eyes blurred more than usual, and not just because he doesn't have his glasses on. He suddenly felt warm water trickle down his cheeks. Unable to keep it in any longer, he buried his face into a nearby pillow and howled into it, wishing with all of his might that the accident never happened. If he had gotten out of the car, if he hadn't been playing his game so much, if he hadn't been so careless...perhaps they'd still like him. The boy he used to be-the one that had friends who liked him-was now gone. He cried loudly and passionately into his pillow, banging his little fists on it to beat the stuffing out of it._

(end flashback)

"They can suck it for all I care…" Kyoya muttered to himself bitterly. "They deserve it. They all do."

* * *

A little earlier than this, in Rina's school, Hikaribashi Elementary School-second grade-Rina sat in her colorful classroom along with her many classmates as their slightly old teacher, an old woman in her late forties, handed out paper and crayons to every kid in the classroom.

"Alright, class! You've all been so good this past month, so we'll spend this time drawing. The subject for today is your whole family. Be sure to turn it in when the bell rings so we can hang them up during open house," The teacher told them in a peppy, energetic voice that was a little bit shrill.

Rina grabbed a bunch of crayons from the bin and immediately began coloring. Unlike Riko, Rina isn't very good at drawing, but she didn't care. She poured over the drawing, coloring everything, from their new house to every member of her family, including their pets, Yumiko the dog, and Caroline and Reese, their cats. Soon, the bell rang, and everyone turned in their drawings, including Rina.

It's time for lunch. But unlike Riko, who's been sitting at a lunch table with friends since the second day of school, it's been almost a month and Rina sits at a lunch table all by herself. Perhaps today will be a good day to finally make some friends. She approached one group of girls who are chatting amongst themselves until they stopped upon seeing Rina looking at them. "Hi!"

"Hello?"

"Oh! Is that taiyaki? I like it too! Can I join you?" Rina asked politely.

"No! Go sit somewhere else!" One girl said.

"Yeah! We don't like stupid people!" Another girl added.

Disappointed, Rina turned around and tried another table. And another. And another. And another. All of them shunned her and refused to let her join them. She couldn't believe it. It's been almost a month and she still hadn't made one single friend! She ate her food, but she suddenly threw her bag of chocolate chip cookies on the floor. She suddenly began stepping on it with her foot, growling like an angry animal, oblivious to the fact that kids were staring at her. Then, the teacher arranged for everyone to stand in lines to go out for recess. This posed a great time for Rina to finally pop the question.

"Alright! I want answers NOW! Why don't you all wanna be my friend?!" Rina asked a group of her classmates in a loud, screechy voice. "What did I do to you that was so bad?!"

Everyone looked at her with scornful looks. One girl walked toward Rina with her arms crossed. "You wanna know why? Because you're mean and nasty and dumb!" The girl told her bluntly, in no uncertain terms.

"No I'm not!" Rina argued.

"Yes you are! I saw you picking on your big sister at the food store for no reason! In fact, that's all you ever talk about! Riko is bad this, Riko is bad that, Riko is a big baby, Riko is dumb and weird and stupid! We're all sick of it!" The girl argued back with gusto. "We don't like mean people, and you're mean!"

"That's right!" One boy echoed her argument. Everyone else nodded.

"But Riko really is dumb and weird! She's always crying over stupid stuff and making everybody stare at us and laugh at us! She watches TV shows for babies, likes to dress up like a cat, and pretend to be one! That's weird and not normal!" Rina protested.

"So? My big sister likes to dress up and watches cartoons with me. She's not bad!" One girl piped in.

"My big brother is kinda weird, but he's nice and helps me with my homework! He's not bad!" Another boy piped in.

"But...but…" Rina tried to protest until she felt a hand on her shoulder. She looked up to find one of the teachers looking at her.

"Rina. Can you come with me? Kesamaru-sensei wants to see you in her office," The teacher said before taking Rina by the hand and escorting her away from the crowd of children.

Rina couldn't believe what she just heard. They never even so much as met Riko, yet they were defending her and standing up for her like she was their friend and not Rina's. They don't like Rina because she's mean to Riko even though they've never seen her cry in class, dress up in animal clothes, pretend to be a cat, or say weird things she's not supposed to. Why do they like Riko when they haven't met her? As far as Rina's concerned, they weren't supposed to like Riko! Rina's normal. She's pretty, talkative, gets better grades than her, and knows better than to be weird.

But why were her classmates siding with Riko, not her? This was different at her last school. Rina was really confused. Soon, Rina found herself sitting in front of a round table, with a woman in her late fifties on the other side, with a head of caramel colored hair in a flouncy ponytail. But she didn't look very happy.

"Hello, Rina. We need to talk," The woman, Mrs. Kesamaru, told her kindly. Her voice had a touch of grimness lurking in it, like she was dead serious about what she wanted to talk about.

"What did I do?" Rina asked frightfully, having a gut feeling that whatever they wanted to talk about wasn't going to be nice and friendly.

Ms. Kesamaru pulled out the drawing Rina made for class earlier today. It's Rina's crude drawing of everyone in her family...except there's no Riko in it. Instead, there's a tall, yellow haired girl with tan skin, wearing a choppy pink outfit, choppy because of Rina's cursory coloring skills. Rina drew herself next to her, smiling and happy, just like everyone else in her drawing. "Tell me. You have a sister named Riko, right?"

"Yes."

"How come she's not in this picture?"

"Yeah she is. She's right there," Rina pointed to the yellow haired person in the drawing.

"I've met your sister before. She has short black hair. This person has long, yellow hair," Ms. Kesamaru explained. Although her gaze is kind, the tone of her voice is serious and icy, not in the mood for any jokes or friendly chit chat.

"I know. That's Riko."

"No it's not. If it's Riko, why did you draw her with yellow hair?"

"That's still Riko, only that's what I pretend she's looks like. Beautiful with yellow hair, normal, not weird, doesn't scream at everything, doesn't dress like an animal, doesn't pretend to be one, wears normal people clothes, and doesn't do weird stuff like jump around, do that flappy thing with her hands, all that weirdo people stuff," Rina explained.

Mrs. Kesamaru facepalmed, sighed, and shook her head, like she heard a ridiculous excuse to play hooky or something. Rina titled her head to one side in confusion. "The kids tell me you say mean things about Riko every day. Do you say mean things to her a lot?"

"Yeah. If I do, it'll make her normal."

"Who told you that?"

"The kids at my other school. They said if I keep doing it, they'll be my friend, and it worked. Mom and Dad keep telling me to stop, but they don't know it works."

Mrs. Kesamaru facepalmed again. For what it was worth, she had to at least give Arinao and Saki credit for trying to teach her right, even if it didn't go well. "Rina. You can't go on like this. That's not a good way to treat your sister, nor is it a way to make friends. Everyone has a place in this world and in a family. Are you really that convinced being mean to your sister is going to magically make her autism go away? That's not how life works, Rina."

"But...but...she's weird and dumb! I don't have friends because of her! She's always making people stare at us with her crying over stupid stuff! She ruined by 5th birthday party because she wanted to turn off my boom box and I wouldn't let her!" Rina protested, surprised that even the teacher is agreeing with the kids. "She did it to make me look bad!"

"Did she really?" Mrs. Kesamaru asked sternly, not convinced. "I see what the problem is. Did you know I have an older brother who still wears diapers?"

"Really? That's so weird!" Rina exclaimed without any hesitation, her eyes wide with surprise. There are grown ups who act like babies? That sounded gross. Mrs. Kesamaru didn't seem to be fazed by Rina's blunt and inopportune response to that.

"Actually, no he doesn't."

"Huh? But you just said-"

"I lied. He doesn't wear diapers and is capable of looking after himself. I see what the problem is."

"What do you see?"

"You're gullible."

"Huh? What does that mean?"

"It means you think everything you hear is true, even the silliest of lies. I told you that lie so I could see if you would fall for it or not, which you did, which proves that you're gullible. We really need to work on that, especially in regards to your sister and making friends. Speaking of which, those kids at your last school were lying to you. Picking on Riko is NOT going to make her normal nor will it help you make friends. You hurt her feelings if you do that."

"But the kids at my other school say people like her don't have any feelings."

"Really? She smiles when she's happy, she cries when she's sad, and she's angry when someone does something wrong. Those are feelings. Everyone has feelings. Let me put it this way: if Riko really didn't have feelings, she wouldn't be sad when you say mean things to her. Telling someone they're bad just because they're different hurts their feelings, and I'm sure Riko's feelings have been hurt quite a lot."

Rina shut her mouth right then. She had a point. Riko definitely laughed whenever she was happy, cried when she was sad, and yelled when she was angry. Yes, there were times when Riko DID cry when Rina said and did particularly mean things to her. Rina couldn't possibly deny all of that. She saw it with her own eyes and heard it with her own ears.

"Rina. Don't get me wrong. I'm sure you're a good girl in your own way. But a lot of what you've been taught by the kids at your other school is wrong, and what you're doing to Riko is wrong, too. Riko's a person just like you are, and you should never be cruel to someone who's different or behaves in different ways than usual just because you don't like it. Different doesn't mean bad, and there are ways we can learn to live with someone's eccentricities and accept them for who they are. Pretending she doesn't exist and wishing for her autism to just go away is not a good way to go about it. There's a lot we need to work on here."

"How do you know? You don't have a weirdo sister who pretends she's a cat and cries a lot and makes people stare at you and does that flappy thing with her hands and watches stuff she's too old for! I just want to be normal and have friends!" Rina shouted, hoping to be able to contradict her this time.

"I may not have any siblings who are autistic, but I've helped a lot of autistic children since I started working here, and everyone is different. But here in this school, we do not shun someone because they're different. Here, we treat everyone with respect and kindness. Don't you want to be treated with respect? Doesn't Riko want to be treated with respect?"

"But people who are different aren't normal!" Rina protested.

"Rina. Let me ask you...what _is_ normal to you?"

"Uh…" Rina had to wonder herself. What IS normal? She knew she had some definition of what it meant based on what the kids at her other school told her (or tricked her into believing), but how could she put it into words? Then again, she didn't have to pull a definition straight out of a dictionary. "Well...I know girls are normal by wearing pretty dresses and jewelry, talking about boys, playing with Barbies, wearing nail polish, putting on makeup, and boys are normal by riding skateboards and scooters, picking their noses-blech!-pushing each other, playing sports, watch cartoons, being messy and rude, all that stuff."

"Not all girls wear makeup or wear dresses, and not all boys play sports and pick their noses. In fact, there are lots of boys who like girl stuff and girls who like boy stuff. I have a little boy, and he loves My Little Pony, and all of his friends do, too."

"Boys can't like My Little Pony! It's for girls! Boys don't like girly stuff!"

"There's lots of boys who like girly stuff. In fact, there are grown up men who like girly stuff and are okay with it. What you're doing right now is called stereotyping. It's when the forces that be try to put everybody in a box and expect them to stay in there forever because they're afraid of change, or because it's supposedly how it is, or because they don't like it. They don't bother to see the rest of the person. You have to get the whole picture if you want to know someone or be friends with them. That's a nice thing to do. Your father tells me Riko is very nice, gets good grades, isn't good at math, loves cats, cartoons, and drawing. But you don't want to see these things. All you see is the bad in her. You can't live your life seeing only the bad in people, or thinking their good qualities are bad, and expecting them to change because you're not okay with it."

Rina found herself shrinking into her seat. She brought up some really good points, and any time she tried to contradict her, Mrs. Kesamaru always managed to gain the upper hand. _'How does she always know what to say? She read me like a map!'_ Rina thought shamefully. She really didn't want to deal with all of this. Not only that, she isn't sure she knows how. But Mrs. Kesamaru is definitely right about one thing: Rina can't make friends if she keeps picking on Riko, even though her classmates haven't met her before.

But still...why did she still feel angry inside? Why does she feel like she wants to explode at any moment? All she knew for sure was that Mrs. Kesamaru wasn't going to put up with her mean-spirited behavior anymore. But she didn't want to believe what those kids told her at the other school was a lie.

The incident on her 5th birthday was real, Rina knew that much. She found herself going back to that day, when she and her many classmates stuffed their faces with cake, M&amp;M's, potato chips, and lots of other candies, dressing up in wild and crazy outfits, bouncing around the room singing loudly while a boom box played a loud rap and hip-hop song at almost full volume. To Rina, this was the best birthday party ever. Everyone was having fun...except a wide eyed, mortally terrified, ten-year-old Riko, who was sitting in a corner of the room, frozen, with her ears being pressed on by her little hands, eyes wide with fear, unable to move.

Everything inundated her at once: the children screaming, the horrible rap music, the loud boom box. Riko wanted to run away, but she couldn't leave the house, nor could she move at all. The music was absolutely deafening, and it paralyzed Riko in it's clutches. Saki tried to tell Rina to turn the volume down for Riko's sake, but she and everyone else protested. Finally, she broke out of the corner and turned it off. Some little kids protested and turned it back on, much to Riko's horror. Rina watched, her face red with humiliation, as Riko fought with the other kids. But when the volume suddenly got turned up even louder than usual, that was when Riko suddenly began screaming and crying at the top of her lungs, causing everyone to stop and stare while Saki scrambled into the room to calm her down and turn off the boom box. Right after that, the kids all left, which meant that the party got canceled, and the only noise left was a bawling Riko.

Rina shook the memory out of her mind. _'No! Riko completely ruined my birthday party! I don't see why I have to stop being mean to her! She deserves it for making everybody hate me back then!'_ Rina thought. She wanted to tell Mrs. Kesamaru this, but somewhere in her soul, she knew the latter would be very angry if she did, so she decided not to. But for some reason she couldn't quite put her finger on, anger swirled around in her little heart like a whirlpool. Not only that, Mrs. Kesamaru kept using the words autism and autistic to describe Riko, just like Saki and Arinao did. What is autism and autistic? She wanted to ask Mrs. Kesamaru, but she couldn't. The bell suddenly rang, which means recess was over and classes resumed.

* * *

At 3:00 PM, the final bell's ringing resounded throughout Hikaribashi Middle School, and all the children stormed out of the school building, rejoicing in their freedom for the rest of the day. Saki picked up Riko and Rina like usual. When they got home, Riko stormed to her room, happy to be back. She pulled out some paper and began drawing Moomins and Twilight Cat.

At about 3:30 PM, however, Saki heard a knock at the door. She answered it to find Anzu, Marina, and Kyoya on the front porch. The fairies were with them, but Saki didn't notice, as they were all sitting in Anzu's hood, pretending to be stuffed animals.

"Oh! Hello, kids! I didn't expect to see you here. How are you doing?" Saki told them, surprised by their sudden and unprecedented appearance.

"We heard Riko got upset at school today, so we wanted to come by and see if she's alright, if that's okay with you," Anzu explained.

"Sure! She'll be happy to see you. Come on inside. I made some blueberry muffins if you want some," Saki invited them inside.

"I love blueberry muffins! Can I have one? Please?" Marina suddenly exclaimed cheerfully, her normally sullen and cautious golden eyes suddenly sparkling at the thought of getting a nice blueberry muffin.

"Sure, sweetie," Saki said with a laugh. Anzu was the first to run up the stairs and find Riko's room. Once Marina got a blueberry muffin, she went after her. Kyoya slowly crawled up the stairs, taking greater care than usual. Finally, they got to Riko's room, where they found her and Moonbeam drawing on the floor.

"An-chan?! Kyo-chan?! Mari-chan?! Fairies?! What are you all doing here?" Riko yelped as the fairies went to greet Moonbeam.

"We felt bad about not being able to help you when you broke down in math class, so we came to hang out for a while. Is that okay?" Kyoya said.

"Sure! I'm so happy you came! Thanks!" Riko said with a smile as she sat on her bed.

"Kyoya-kun's really good at math, so he can help you with it," Marina piped in.

"Thanks! I stink at math," Riko said sheepishly.

"Me too! Math has never been my best subject," Moonbeam said.

"You're probably way better at it than me," Riko told her.

"Are these your drawings? They're really cute!" Anzu crooned sweetly as she took a look at one of Riko's Twilight Cat drawings.

Riko blushed a bit. "They're not great. I'll never be as good as you, An-chan."

"I think they're cute, too," Marina agreed.

The kids got so lost in their chattering that they failed to notice Rina standing dumbfounded and flabbergasted at the entrance to Riko's room. Rina felt a pang of envy shoot right through her heart. Riko has friends. Real friends, not imaginary ones. True, she had known that for a while, but she still hadn't gotten used to it. She expected Riko to be lonely and friendless forever. But no, she has friends who like her and the same things she likes. She was talking happily, laughing, receiving clarification on Mr. Ikari's math lesson.

Why couldn't Rina have friends to talk to? Why can't Rina have people to talk to, laugh with, gossip with, and help with their homework? Rina wished she had someone to play Barbies with, play dress up with, play board games with. Rina clutched her skirt tightly, her teeth grinding and her dark green eyes suddenly burning with the blazing flames of envy, just like her heart.

Now she realized why she was so angry. All of a sudden, the anger finally burst out.

"YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO HAVE FRIENDS!" Rina shouted at the top of her lungs, causing the older kids to stop talking and turn their heads to the entrance. Riko hid behind Anzu, cowed by Rina's outburst. Kyoya silently gave her the stink eye. "You're weird and stupid and dumb and ruin everything! Everything bad that happened to me is your fault! People like you aren't supposed to have friends! Why do you have friends and not me?! I'm the normal one! I'm the one who's supposed to have friends! I'm better than you at everything, but...why?! You're not even supposed to have any feelings! And yet…" Tears suddenly began bubbling out of Rina's eyes, dripping off of her chin and dissolving onto Riko's hardwood floor. "...nobody likes me anymore! I'm the normal one and yet...I don't...have any friends…it's your fault I don't have any friends!"

Marina and Anzu couldn't believe what they were hearing. This is what Riko's little sister is like? They've heard stories about how bratty and annoying Rina behaves and the mean things she says to Riko on a daily basis, but at first, they thought she was exaggerating, not that they didn't believe her. But...to think her little seven-year-old sister would go this far. Claiming she's supposed to not have friends? Call her stupid, dumb, and weird right in full view of other people? Claim she doesn't have feelings? Use her as a scapegoat for everything bad that happens in her life? Claim she's better than her in every way? It seems Riko wasn't exaggerating after all. Rina wanted to go on, but she got cut off.

"All of that is YOUR fault!" Rina looked up tearfully to see Kyoya looking at her with an extremely icy look. "It's because you keep treating her like that that nobody likes you! Nobody likes people who do nothing but be mean to people and wish everything about them could be erased because they don't like it!" Kyoya cried out venomously, his honest yet poisonous words razor sharp. "And you have some nerve trying to blame Riko for everything bad that goes on in your life! You're the one ruining your own life because you care more about being popular and liked by everyone than being a good sister! Sisters do drive each other nuts, but they care for each other and try to help each other, not wish they came out differently because they have things they don't like!"

"Uh...Kyo-chan? I think-" Riko tried to cut him off, but he kept on going, paying her absolutely no heed whatsoever.

"Who told you all of this garbage about autistic people having no feelings? Huh?! Who told you?!"

"My friends at my last school! They said if I'm mean to her, they'll be my friends! It worked before!"

"Well, they're wrong! They lied to you! All they did was take advantage of you and use you to make themselves look good! They've warped your mind! You call Riko stupid and dumb, but honestly, that describes YOU more than anything!" Kyoya yelled. He couldn't stop himself. He was on a roll. He left Rina and everyone else absolutely speechless. Her frightened green eyes became wider and wider, becoming a sea of confusion. "What if something bad happened to Riko? What if she got seriously hurt or even died?! Would you be happy about that?!"

"No!"

"If something DID happen to Riko, would you WANT her to die?!"

"NO!"

"Would you be happy if you saw someone else be mean to her or even hurt her?! HUH?!"

"No no no no!" Rina screamed, stamped her feet, and flapped her little fists up and down.

"Kyoya-kun! Please, calm down! You might want to-" Even Marina tried to make him stop, but Kyoya paid her no heed.

"Nobody's gonna change everything about themselves just because you don't like it, especially stuff they can't! You don't get to decide things for them either, like whether they can have friends or not! How do you think Riko feels when you're mean to her and call her names?! You say she has no feelings, but she gets picked on by people all the time, and just earlier today she cried her eyes out because she couldn't understand today's math lesson! How is that any different from when you're sad about something?! Do you think it's okay for you to be sad and not for Riko to be sad? Do you think it's okay for you to have friends and not Riko?! Do you seriously think it's okay to be mean to her and not when others are mean to you?! Huh?! Answer me!"

"Kyo-chan! Quiet down! You'll get in trouble!" Even Riko didn't like where this was going.

Rina looked down at the floor silently, balling her frail little fists. She grinded her teeth. God, she really wanted to contradict him! But what could she say? How could she argue with him and win? Her heart kept telling her he was wrong, but doubts began sprouting in her heart. She couldn't say anything more after that. All of a sudden, Saki came into the room with a flummoxed look on her face. "What's going on in here?"

Kyoya didn't care that Saki was in here. Rina's stunned, tearful silence gave Kyoya the answer he needed, and it felt great to call Rina out on her cruel behavior. "You're such a spoiled little brat! Grow up and get over it! The world doesn't revolve around you!"

"Enough!" Riko shouted nervously. She figured Saki might have heard the whole thing considering how loud both of their voices are, and their house wasn't exactly soundproof. Rina just stood there, frozen in stunned silence, with tears bubbling out of her eyes, streaming down her contorted, chubby face. Saki silently and gently took Rina by the hand and escorted her to her room. As soon as she went in, her soft, high pitched whimpering exploded into full on bawling. Riko closed the door, which managed to muffle the sound quite a bit.

"Uhh...you really didn't have to go that far, y'know. Maybe you should have let Saki handle it. She is Rina's mother after all," Moonbeam told him.

"Sorry. I just absolutely hate it when people demonize others and think they're so much better than them just because they feel like having weaknesses and flaws is a big deal," Kyoya told them bitterly. Fukiko and Daizo's betrayal flashed through his mind again. "I've already been through it. I don't want you going through it, Riko, and she's your sister! You've wanted to call her out on it for a long time, haven't you?"

"Uhh...well, yeah, you're right about that, but I'm never able to come up with the right words, and usually when I do, Mom or Dad tell us to stop yelling or Rina never lets me finish," Riko told him upon further rumination.

"I don't think ripping her apart like that was the best way to go about it," Sunbeam reasoned.

"I...kind of agree. Mom could have yelled at you," Riko agreed. "She'll probably call your mom and dad and tell them about it, and you'll get grounded."

"So? Someone's gotta tell it like it is! Why can't I? It's when people tell it like it is people actually get what they've done wrong! You can't go around sugarcoating stuff! Sometimes, you have to hurt someone's feelings-if they have any at all-if it'll make them realize the errors of their ways!" Kyoya protested.

"I don't like sugarcoating stuff either, so I get you. But Rina's seven years old. She probably doesn't understand half of what you told her," Marina said.

"She has to. I'm sick of watching her treat you like you're inhuman!" Kyoya told Riko. "Someone's gotta give her a reality check."

"Spoken like a true friend, Kyo-chan!" Lovebeam piped in.

Although Riko agreed he went too far in yelling at both Fukiko and Rina, deep in the confines of her little heart, she wactually happy that Kyoya finally called Rina out on her mean spirited behavior. True, he could have done it in a nicer fashion that involved less yelling, but she did agree that she really needed a reality check, and he's right in that the world doesn't revolve around her. Riko had been dying to call Rina out on her stupid preconceived notions for years now, but she just wasn't able to come up with the right words for it. That, and whenever she would yell at her, Rina would either not let her finish or play the victim and say something like, _"MOOOM! Riko's yelling at meeee!"_ Riko always hated when Rina did that.

"Thanks, Kyo-chan," Riko whispered shyly.

"Don't mention it, Ri-chan. Sorry I had to do it in front of you. I know you hate yelling," Kyoya replied in a softer, kinder voice this time.

* * *

Around the same time the trio of well meaning friends went to Riko's house to try and comfort her, Kayoko heard a knock on her own door. She went to answer it to find Fukiko trembling on the front ramp.

"Fukiko-chan!" Kayoko exclaimed upon opening the door. "It's been such a long time! Come on in!" Reluctantly, Fukiko stepped inside and sat on the living room couch. "Can I get you anything? A glass of juice? Water?"

"Actually…" Fukiko stammered shyly. She really couldn't understand why Kayoko was so bubbly and energetic, like she was happy to see her. She felt like she didn't deserve it. "Is Kyoya here by any chance?"

"Unfortunately, no. He went to Riko-chan's house to be with her. He said something about her having a little meltdown in math class and wanting to help her out," Kayoko explained as she sat down next to Fukiko.

The green dressed girl's broken pieces of her heart sank further into the desolate depths of her chest cavity. She knew about Riko's meltdown. She saw it in class. They shared the same math class, and she sat next to Riko, so she couldn't help but see and hear it. She found it unsettling, but not enough to decide to change her opinion about her.

Her eyesight began to blur, and she knew why. "I see. He's so nice to her. He's a good friend...unlike me…" Her voice choked upon saying that part part. That was when the tears started to flow for real, just like earlier when Kyoya gave her an epic _'reason you suck'_ speech. She found herself burying her face in her hands and sobbing uncontrollably. "Kayoko-san...I'm so sorry for everything I've done to Kyoya-kun! I've been so absolutely horrible to him for the past year and a half all because I'm a stupid stupid stupid little idiot!"

Kayoko's heart went out to the girl. She slowly and gently wrapped her arms around the crying girl and pulled her close. "There there."

"I...I tried to apologize to him today, but he doesn't believe I really feel bad about what I've done...he thinks I just don't want to feel guilty anymore...and that I'm not truly sorry…" Fukiko sobbed and cried into her hands, unable to stop. Her chest hurt from too much crying, but she couldn't stop no matter what. "I've been so horrible to him! He's right! I'm an awful person! I never even bothered to find out which hospital he went to so I could visit him! I betrayed him when he needed me the most! I...I want to apologize again, but...it probably won't work. He can hate me forever. You can, too. I deserve it! I deserve all the punishment in the world! He's done so much for me...I've known him since 3rd grade and I completely cut him out of my life all because of something that isn't his fault!"

Kayoko didn't say anything throughout Fukiko's bawling. She continued to embrace the girl who poured out her heartfelt woes. Unlike Kyoya, Kayoko could tell Fukiko's tears and words were genuine and that the crying girl was definitely remorseful. If she didn't feel remorse, she wouldn't have come all the way here trying to find him and make up with him, and she wouldn't be bawling like this in her arms. If that kind of gesture wasn't a genuine, heartfelt display of remorse and a wish to atone, then she didn't know what was. Kayoko stroke Fukiko's back gently, hoping this would reassure her a bit.

"I'm glad you're being honest with me. Thank you for at least doing this much," Kayoko whispered kindly. "Some teachers told me about him yelling at you earlier. I'm sorry he's so blunt. He has a tendency to be a little too honest for his own good, and ends up hurting people's feelings. I don't approve of what you've done, but I'm at least happy that now you realize the error of your ways."

"No. It's fine. I deserved it. I...I know I probably don't deserve this, but...I...I really want to make it up to him. Let him know I don't think of him as a cripple anymore. No, I KNOW he's not a cripple. I know, that's a mean word to say, but everyone at school says it, and it makes me mad to hear them call him that. But I'm too much of a stupid coward to tell them to stop...how do I make it up to him and you?" Fukiko asked, her own tear filled eyes looking right into Kayoko's eyes.

"Since you couldn't be there for him back then...I think he'd really appreciate it if you could be there for him now. Hold on just a second," Kayoko told her kindly before walking toward the kitchen to get something. She came back and handed her a piece of paper, with the address of a physical therapy center written on it in hiragana and kanji. "This is the place Kyo-chan goes for physical therapy on weekends, sometimes on weekdays, like Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday."

"Oh! My mom and I drive past this place when we go to the bank or the food store!" Fukiko exclaimed, her voice croaking a little due to too much crying.

"He also does physical therapy in the nurse's office during gym class," Kayoko said.

"Thanks for telling me this. I really appreciate it. I'm sorry I took so long to...even apologize."

"Better late than never, right?"

"Actually...I had been wanting to apologize for him for the past few months now. I just...never had the courage. Tasogare-san convinced me to go through with it...even though I crashed and burned."

"Do you mean Riko-chan?"

"Yeah, the new girl. Kyoya-kun likes her a lot, and I'm happy for them. No, not in a romantic way. My mom yelled at me about my behavior long before she moved here, but...seeing them laughing together and talking together...and Riko not being freaked out by his being in a wheelchair...made me realize what a stupid idiot I've been for abandoning him like that. She's been really nice to me, but I think it's because she doesn't know what a bad person I've been for the past few months."

"That may be true, but I believe everyone deserves a second chance. Plus, I think Riko-chan knew you wanted to make up with him and probably gave you the nudge you needed," Kayoko told her.

Fukiko clutched the paper in her little hands. "Yeah. I'd like to be friends with her, but I don't know...we're probably waaaay too different to be friends. I like fashion, going shopping, being a cheerleader, wearing dresses and skirts, and collecting magazines with cute boys on them. She looks like the type who's not into that stuff, not that I mind."

"You don't have to have the exact same interests in order to be friends. I was friends with a girl when I was your age and she and I were as different as night and day. I was very into watching Toku anime, like Kamen Rider, and playing the piano while she liked to dream about getting married and play tennis and go on and on about any cute boy that walked onto the school premises," Kayoko told her cheerfully.

"Isn't Kamen Rider for boys?"

"Nope! Boys are allowed to watch girl stuff just as much as girls are allowed to watch boy stuff. The world is changing, and sometimes change is good."

The two of them giggled merrily. "Thanks for listening to me."

"You're welcome, sweetie. But if you do want to make it up to Kyoya, I think it'd be best if you waited a bit until he's in a better mood. Let things cool down a bit. In fact, you don't even have to say it with words. I think he'd appreciate it if you'd come to his physical therapy sessions every once in a while, just so he knows that you'll be there for him this time. He tends to be really grumpy and cranky when he's in a bad mood. Believe me, I learned the hard way."

"I'll bet."

Although her chest hurt from too much crying, Fukiko left the Mitomo house with a light heart and a strong resolve.

* * *

"Decebal! Check me out!"

At the top of a set of stairs, Beileag entered the room like she was Cinderella about to dance with her prince charming. But instead of wearing an overly beautiful, lacy, and poofy dress, she was wearing a fairly simple but pretty, sleeveless, pale purple dress that went to her knees, with a lace border on the chest part and the straps. Beileag also put on matching purple shoes and purple scrunchies to set off her indigo colored pigtails. Instead of being delighted by Beileag's regal entrance, simply dressed as she was, he just stood there, dumbfounded.

"Uhh...you went shopping again, didn't you, Billie?" Decebal asked with Zenjin's cold medicine in his gloves.

"Not the whole time! I really did try to look for any schools that are by the ocean! But there's just sooooo many in all of Japan, I never know where to start! It doesn't help that Zenjin doesn't even remember other details like the name or what it looks like, not that I can blame him. But I did stop by a cute little clothes store and I found this lovely little dress! As soon as I saw it, I knew I just had to have it! Do you like it? Does it look good on me? I got it for really cheap, too! Can you believe it?" Beileag asked cheerfully as she twirled around. The skirt floated in the air as she spun like a ballerina. She really made the dress come alive.

"You look beautiful, Billie. But don't wear it in front of Zenjin. You know how he is with dresses," Decebal told her in a well intentioned warning voice.

"I know, I know. But I shouldn't be denied my right to look nice and classy, now should I? It's not like he's the boss of me," Beileag said.

What neither of them knew was that Zenjin walked into the room, and he happened to glance at Beileag at the top of the stairs. As soon as his bloody red eyes fixated on Beileag-particularly her purple dress-they suddenly grew extremely big, blazing with bloodlust.

Before anyone could react, Beileag could feel an explosion right beneath her legs, sending her flying. Thankfully for her, Decebal managed to get her out of the giant puff of smoke that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. As soon as the smoke cleared, however…

"Aaaagh! My brand new dress is ruined!" Beileag whined upon seeing part of her dress ripped and tattered, covered with laser marks. As she got out of Decebal's arms, she suddenly felt a fist lift her up by the shirt. Soon, she found herself face to face with a livid Zenjin. A chill ran up her spine.

"NEVER. EVER. _EVER_. WEAR THIS _TRASH_ IN FRONT OF ME EVER AGAIN!" Zenjin told her in a cold, austere, icy, low voice at first, then outright screamed at the top of his lungs right in Beileag's face, his already high pitched voice going up an octave or two. Some spit flew onto Beileag's face. Before she could push him off, he yanked on one of the straps of her dress with such force that it ripped right off.

"Yeek!" Beileag pushed him off this time, clutching what remained of her tattered. "Will you calm down?!"

"NO! You're wearing that trash! That's why! Take it off RIGHT NOW!" Zenjin yelled before Decebal waltzed in between the two.

"You're not the boss of me!" Beileag snapped.

"Billie. Go change into something else. You'll save yourself from getting killed," Decebal told her calmly.

Beileag sighed and rolled her eyes at the same time. "Fiiiine…" After that, she went into her room and changed into her usual hippie clothes while Decebal went into the kitchen to make something for Zenjin. But when they both came back…

"Uhh...where's Zen-chan?" Beileag asked upon noticing he's not in his room anymore.

Decebal looked all throughout the fortress. He looked everywhere. No Zenjin. Decebal facepalmed. "Ugh...he must have gone to Earth again! He still has a cold! He'll get sicker if he keeps running off like this!"

* * *

"Hey guys!" Hikage chirped happily as he and Hotaru walked into the living room, where Riko, Anzu, and Marina are playing a round of Jenga.

"Hi, Niichan! Hi, Hotaru-chan!" Riko greeted them as she put a block on top of the staggering tower of Jenga blocks.

"Is that Jenga? I haven't played that in years!" Hotaru exclaimed.

"Where's Kyoya? Doesn't he normally hang out with you?" Hikage asked, noticing that Kyoya isn't among them.

"He had to leave early. Curfew," Anzu piped in as Marina tried to pull out a block, only to have it tumbling down in a frenzy.

"Dawww! I want a rematch!" Marina complained as she picked some blocks off of her lap and put them on the table.

"Want to join us, Hotaru-san?" Anzu asked politely.

All of a sudden, Lovebeam's long ears stood straight up in alarm. She floated over to Anzu. "An-chan," Lovebeam whispered, and then whispered something in her ears. Anzu gestured everyone to come closer, which they did, and heard what Lovebeam had to say..

"Uhh...Hikage? Is it okay if we all go for a walk?" Riko asked.

"Sure! Just don't stay out too long. Mom's gonna cook dinner soon, and keep your house key with you!" Hikage called back.

"Thanks!" Riko said as they put the blocks back in the Jenga box and bolted out the door.

"Girls, are you ready?" Hotaru asked.

The girls nodded.

* * *

Upon leaving Kyoya's house, Fukiko sighed. She was about to walk some more until she saw Kyoya wheeling toward her a little further away. She found a nearby tree and hid behind it, thinking he might not be in the the mood to see her. But when she looked up, she saw someone sitting in the leafy branches of the tree she's hiding behind. Someone with shimmery silver hair and a red cape, angry chomping on an apple. What Kyoya didn't know is that a pair of bloodthirsty red eyes have fixated on him, and he was going to regret wheeling past that tree. All of a sudden, he felt something hard bonk the back of his head, which tumbled onto the sidewalk. He looked down to find a half eaten apple on the sidewalk.

Then sound of laughter caused him to look up at the tree he's in front of...only to find Zenjin is the one laughing at him like he saw a funny movie. "That's what you get for being a pitiful creature! Did I forget to mention that you don't exist?!"

Fukiko couldn't believe what this silver haired kid was saying. She wanted to scold him, but she could tell he looked dangerous, and she doesn't know any martial arts or self-defense skills, so she kept herself scarce. All of a sudden, Zenjin leaped in front of Kyoya, wanting to strangle him like he wanted to on their first meeting. Unfortunately for him, a fiery music note stopped him from doing so.

"Dusk Medley!"

Zenjin leaped away the minute the burning musical note came flying at him. Thankfully, it didn't hit Kyoya in any way. When he flew a safe distance away from the burning note, out came the Pretty Cure, gracefully descending in between them with austere looks on their faces.

"Up to your old tricks again, eh? We're not going to let you whatever it is you plan on doing!" Anzu edicted.

'_WHAT?! Superheroes?! I...I heard the stories but I thought it was a movie or just a bunch of baloney!'_ Fukiko thought, flabbergasted by their regal appearance.

"We will banish the darkness with the light from our hearts! We are the luminous quartet! LuminousQ Pretty Cure!"

'_Pretty Cure? Isn't that an anime I used to watch when I was younger? Is it still going on? They're actually REAL?!'_ Fukiko's eyes widened further.

"Yay! Trashy outlets for my frustration! Take this, you trash!" Zenjin yelled as he fired a black ball of light at the girls, only for it to be knocked away by Cure Starlight's naginata.

"We are NOT your outlets!" Cure Starlight edicted in a strong, booming voice.

"Kyo-chan. Go somewhere safe," Cure Twilight whispered.

"Okay. Be careful," Kyoya said before wheeling away. But he didn't intend to leave the scene. He thought their battles with Zenjin were cool, so he hid somewhere where it was likely he wouldn't be seen. Starbeam followed him, staying with him for precautionary reasons.

Cure Twilight was the first to act, attempting to land some punches on the cocky silver haired boy, but he managed to evade every single one of them just by moving his body in different directions. All of a sudden, he grabbed one of Cure Twilight's arms and threw her against a tree, the same one Fukiko was hiding behind. She got back on her feet, but Cure Dusk unleashed another Dusk Medley on him. Zenjin made a black force field around himself. When he took it down, Cure Dusk tried to unleash a flurry of kicks and punches, only to be punched in the stomach and sent flying.

Cure Dawn tried swinging her nunchucks at him, but he caught them and yanked them out of her hand. She did manage to step on his cape and make him slip and fall, allowing her to both get her nunchucks back and kick him. But he retaliated via another energy blast. Then Cure Starlight tried to ambush him with a Starlight Shower, but he not only knocked all the stars away, he shot another energy blast at her, sending her flying into a brick house. Not only that, he recklessly fired other energy blasts at the Cures rapidly.

Twilight held up a shield while Dawn and Dusk deflected some with their own attacks. Others successfully managed to knock down a huge amount of trees, including the ones Fukiko and Kyoya are hiding behind, and leave a huge wall in one brick house.

"Hey! There are people here, y'know! You could kill them!" Cure Twilight yelled.

"Think I care?!" Zenjin sneered as he attempted to fire another energy blast at her, only to find himself suddenly getting knocked off his feet by a little pink tornado, which turned out to be a livid Lovebeam.

"That's what you get for being cruel to my sister, you brute!" Lovebeam yelled as she tried to land another attack on him, but he grabbed one of her long ears and threw her against a tree.

"Starlight Kick!" Cure Starlight tried to kick him, but he grabbed her foot and sent her flying again, this time sending her against another tree.

"Twilight Serenade!" Cure Twilight shot a purple ray of light at him, but he dodged it and very brutally punched her multiple times. Moonbeam and Sunbeam tried to stop him from hurting her more, but he knocked them all away. Twilight found her whole face throbbing and her lower lip bleeding a little.

"Dawn Flame!" Cure Dawn tried to engulf him in flames but he punched her in the jaw and sent her flying against another brick house before she could do anything else.

"He's so strong…" Cure Dusk stammered as she tried to get back on her feet, only to grimace as her abdomen throbbed in a painful way, probably from the kick she got from Zenjin earlier.

"He has the Energia. He's on the same level as the Gods now…" Lovebeam told her hopelessly.

"I'm not giving up just yet! Twilight Sparkle!" Cure Twilight struggled to get on her feet and threw her Twilight Ring at him. But he simply dodged it. However, he caught sight of Kyoya, exposed after his tree fell down. His bloodthirsty eyes growing big with bloodlust, he flew over to the wheelchair bound boy, grabbed him by the neck, and lifted him out of his chair, much to Starbeam's horror.

"Release him this instant, you knave!" Starbeam headbutted him, but with one hand he grabbed her and threw her to the concrete sidewalk like she was trash.

"You don't exist! You don't deserve to exist, you pitiful creature!" Zenjin screeched vehemently as he tried to strangle the life out of the kid, who did struggle and scratch Zenjin's arms with his sharp fingernails. But Zenjin barely noticed the cuts Kyoya's fingernails are making on his skin.

Cure Twilight's eyes grew large with horror. She tried to go save him, but one of her legs gave out from too much fighting, plus there was a huge scab on her left knee that was making it hard for her to move. Everyone else has sustained injuries too.

But as it turned out, she didn't have to save him after all.

"NOOO!" A voice screamed with all it's might as someone successfully pried Zenjin's hands off of Kyoya's neck and pushed him a few feet back. At first, the girls thought it was one of the fairies, but they were all with them, and Starbeam was too far away from Kyoya to have been able to help him. They all looked up.

Zenjin was flabbergasted, the bloodthirsty look in his eyes suddenly being replaced with fear.

Kyoya's airway was finally free, but even he couldn't believe who came to his rescue.

Standing in between Kyoya and Zenjin, trembling like crazy, was a girl their age with long, chocolate brown hair, green clover earrings, and a green and turquoise dress.

"FUKIKO?!"

Yes, it's Fukiko, of all people! Her hazel eyes are now donning a glint blazing with courage, staring Zenjin down...and it was actually working, because as soon as he laid eyes on her, he took a few steps back, like he saw something that scared the living daylights out of him.

"LEAVE MY FRIEND ALONE, YOU BULLY!" Fukiko screamed the highest voice she could muster. But they could all tell she was still scared out of her own wits. Her legs were shaking, looking like they were going to buckle at any moment. But she kept going. "Get away from him! What did he ever do to you that was so bad?!"

'_Fukiko...you're putting your life on the line for me…'_ Kyoya couldn't believe his eyes. The one person he hates with the fiery passion of a thousand suns actually put her life on the line to save him. She was a powerless little girl, yet she was staring down a kid older than her who has a jewel in his bloodstream and has powers equal to those of Gods. Before, Kyoya kept his heart encased in ice just so he could deal with what happened. Now, the ice melted away, becoming warm and soft.

However, she's not the only one who's scared.

Fukiko was the first to see it. "Uh...are you okay?"

Zenjin's bloody red eyes were now consumed with absolutely nothing but naked, unadulterated fear, like he was going through an extremely traumatic experience. His eyes got so huge they looked like they were going to pop right out of his head. He took a few more steps back. He didn't see a rock underneath one of his feet, so he slipped and fell on his rear end. He barely noticed.

"What?! Why are you so scared all of a sudden?!" Fukiko yelled.

"Why...why are you...wearing that?!" Zenjin stammered with an extremely fearful and frightened tone of voice that sounded like he was about to cry and scream at any moment.

Flummoxed, Fukiko looked down at her dress, then at Zenjin. "My dress? What's that got to do with anything?!"

Zenjin wasn't looking at Fukiko. He was looking at her dress. To Fukiko, it was just a dress. But to Zenjin, it could very well be one of his biggest fears, like he was face-to-face with a horrible, terrifying monster he wanted nothing but to get away from. All of a sudden, he found himself being dragged down memory lane, and that was not a lane he wanted to be strolling on.

(flashback)

_A large, black silhouette violently dragged a younger, seven-year-old Zenjin across a room by his hair, it's large, chubby, marshmallow like hand clinging tightly onto a huge clump of it. Zenjin yelled, kicked, pleaded, and screamed, but the black silhouette dragging him through the messy house absolutely refused to relent. It had his silver hair in an iron grip, not intent on letting go anytime soon. _

_Not only that, Zenjin wasn't even wearing boy's clothes. He was wearing a small dress with a yellow bodice with orange flowers embroidering it, an orange skirt, an orange Peter Pan collar, and sunny yellow buttons. But the situation was anything but sunny and pleasant._

"_Let me go! Lemme go!" Zenjin screamed as he tried to break out of the person's grasp by planting his bare feet on the floor and clawing at the person's chubby marshmallow hand, but the silhouette absolutely refused to relent. It didn't help that Zenjin's fingernails were so small and chewed up they couldn't possibly leave any marks on the silhouette's chubby, marshmallow arm._

"_Shut up, you brat!"_

"_I don't wanna wear this!" Zenjin protested._

"_That's your Halloween costume! Get over it and get out there! You're not coming in until I say so, you trash!" The silhouette yelled as it opened the door. Zenjin tried to get back in, but the woman had him in a strong, iron grip, not letting him get back in the house. _

"_I said you're NOT coming back in until I say so! Now OUT!" With great strength, the silhouette flung Zenjin out the front door, sending him tumbling down the porch. She closed the door in front of him before he could dash back in._

_With tears streaming down his eyes, his silver hair a jumbled mess, and dressed in clothes he really shouldn't be wearing, Zenjin pounded on the front door of his wooden house. "Let me in! Let me in! Please!"_

_He banged on the door with all of his might, hoping she would let him in. But she didn't let him in. He kept pounding and wailing on the door for what appeared to be hours. No response. The woman didn't come out. He was all alone. Not only that, he was outside, and it was extremely dark, with a few solitary streetlights flickering on the corners of the street, with a few kids in costumes walking around happily with bags in their hands overflowing with all kinds of candy. _

_But Zenjin couldn't go out there, especially not in a dress! They'd laugh at him! He knows they will. But then again, that's probably what the woman wanted. It didn't help that the dress was sleeveless, he was barefoot, and the bitterly cold weather stung his bare skin all over. Seeing that his efforts were futile, he fell to his knees and cried helplessly, burying his freezing face against the wooden door, leaving some splinters on his red cheeks.._

"_Let me in…"_

(end flashback)

Without warning, the naked fear in his eyes morphed back into bloodlust. "Take it off!"

"Huh?!"

"TAKE THAT TRASH OFF!" Zenjin grabbed Fukiko by the neck and flung her against the tree before anyone could react. Fukiko coughed and tried to get away, but he punched her in the face. Despite this, she tried to run, but he grabbed one of her feet and pried off one of her shoes, which he then used to maliciously beat the living daylights out of the poor girl, who struggled and kicked and screamed for her life. He viciously beat her on the head multiple times with her shoe, not bothering to let up. After that, he grabbed onto the front of her dress and yanked on it so hard he ripped a huge chunk of it off.

"Get off her!" Cure Dawn tried to grab him and save her, but he kicked her in the stomach, sending her to the sidewalk.

"HELP MEEEEE!" Fukiko screamed in an even higher voice this time. It didn't help that this time her Soul Portal suddenly got exposed, and Zenjin wasted NO time putting his head and arm in there to yank out her soul.

"Let her go, you!" Cures Twilight and Dawn, Moonbeam, and Lovebeam grabbed him and tried to pull him out, but he wasn't budging. Finally, they managed to yank him out, but to their horror, he was successful in yanking out her soul and corrupting it.

With a ferocious scream, he threw her corrupted soul into the air, allowing it to turn into a large black chicken that began clucking and running all over the place, stepping on houses and knocking down trees. Cures Starlight and Dusk wasted no time flying over to subdue it. Cures Twilight and Dawn tried to subdue Zenjin, but he blasted them away with a huge explosion of energy, sending them flying onto the giant chicken.

"_I'm sorry, Kyoya! I really am!"_ The chicken clucked somberly as it stepped on some children's toys in front of a house. Cure Dawn, recovering from that energy explosion quickly, subjected it to a particularly brutal Dawn Slam attack. _"I'm sorry I hurt you! I know you don't think I'm truly sorry, but I am! You're allowed to hate me! I deserve it! I want to be a better friend to you this time! If I could turn back time and stop myself from being stupid, I would!"_

Kyoya struggled to get back in his wheelchair, grabbing his backpack as he got back in with Starbeam's help. He didn't think the Fukiko who came to rescue him from Zenjin was the same person. As far as he knew, Fukiko was his ex-best friend who betrayed him when he needed her, Daizo, and everyone else the most, and ignored him ever since. But...somewhere, in the deep, confines of his heart, something was convinced that Fukiko WAS serious about how sorry she was and wanting to make up with him.

Moonbeam, Lovebeam, Sunbeam, Cure Starlight, and Cure Dusk all tried to subdue Zenjin with all they could, from energy beams to flurries of rapid punches and kicks, but he blasted them away with another energy blast. But before he could do anything more, Zenjin felt an iron grip on his hand. He turned around to find Decebal-with his white gloved hand clinging to his arm-and Beileag, both donning disappointed looks on their faces. "Let me go!"

"Zenny! You should know better than to leave the fortress while you're still sick. You'll make yourself sicker than you already are," Decebal told him in an austere tone of voice.

"He's right, y'know. You want to get better and go back to blowing stuff up, don't you?" Beileag asked.

Kyoya saw them appear and stop Zenjin from doing any more damage to not just them, but the town. A bunch of trees had been knocked down already, and a few houses have big holes in them. People were beginning to run away and evacuate as the giant, pitch black chicken began stepping on everything it could see. Then he looked at the Nylon strap dangling from one of his backpack straps. Then at the chicken, the Pretty Cures and fairies struggling to fight it, and then back at his Nylon strap.

An idea popped into his head. If it could just work...he yanked on his Nylon strap, and a deafening, alarm-like sound resounded all throughout the area, causing everyone, including the giant black chicken, to fall to their knees and cover their ears, paralyzed by the absolutely deafening sound.

"What is that?!" Beileag yelled as she tried miserably to plug her ears shut with her hands but to no avail.

"I don't know!" Decebal yelled as loud as he could so Beileag could hear him.

'_It worked! Now's my chance!'_ Kyoya thought as he crawled over to the Pretty Cure and the other three fairies. He tapped on Cure Twilight's hand to get her attention, which worked, as she looked up to see him in front of her.

"Use the Dazzling Gleam now while you have the chance!" Kyoya yelled over the noise.

Cure Twilight nodded and passed along the message to the fairies first, then the other Pretty Cures.

"_Kyoya doesn't think I feel bad about what I've done! But I do!"_ The chicken clucked, frozen by the deafening sound of Kyoya's I-Safe alarm. Despite the noise, the girls and fairies stood up and formed a circle, ready to perform their final purification attack.

"Lend us your power, holy light! Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!" All eight of them glowed in one single, radiant white light, which purified the chicken and turned it into Fukiko's soul orb. It was here that the deafening I-Safe alarm sound finally ceased. All of their ears were ringing, but Cure Dawn picked up the orb.

"We did it!" She exclaimed happily.

"Umm...do you mind if I put it inside her?" Kyoya asked. Without saying anything, Cure Dawn handed Fukiko's soul orb to him. He crawled back into his chair with Fukiko's soul orb in hand, wheeled over to Fukiko's Soul Portal, and dropped the glass ball into it.

As soon as Fukiko's Soul Portal disappeared, the color returned to her face, and her hazel eyes peeled open. Then she shot up and buttoned her jean jacket to cover up the ripped part of her chest. She then turned to Kyoya with a worried and concerned look.

"Kyoya-kun! Are you okay?! You're not hurt, are you?! Did that silver haired guy hurt you like he did me?!" Fukiko yelped.

"I'm fine, Fukiko. Really, I am. He did try to choke me but you stopped him," Kyoya told her. Fukiko didn't seem to notice the blood on her head.

"I...I'm so glad you're okay…" Fukiko blubbered, her entire being awash with a tsunami of relief.

"But you took a pretty nasty beating. You're bleeding from your head," Kyoya told her as he pointed to the top of her head. There was a bloody spot in her hair, and Fukiko felt around it. "I'll call your parents later and tell them to take you to a doctor."

"LEMME AT HER! LEMME AT HER!" Zenjin screamed as he tried to lunge after Fukiko again and possibly do even worse things to her than just beat the living daylights out of her with one of her shoes. Thankfully for the kids and fairies, Beileag held him back.

"No! You're coming back to the fortress with us to get better!" Beileag told him sternly, putting her high heeled foot down.

"NO! I WANNA BLOW HER TRASHY DRESS UP! I _live_ for destroying the very things that make my blood boil!" Zenjin yelled vehemently.

"Go on ahead of me. I'll catch up with you," Decebal told her. Despite Zenjin's vehement protests, Beileag took him back and they both disappeared into thin air. The Pretty Cure, fairies, and the kids stared daggers at him, Fukiko in particular, who stood back up. Decebal pointed his rapier at her neck, but unlike before, she didn't move a millimeter.

"I saw your little display earlier. Tell me, little girl. Why did you put your life on the line for this boy? It's clearly obvious that he's nothing but a crippled boy. A broken, pitiful creature. You're merely a plain Jane with no powers or special abilities," Decebal asked condescendingly.

"He's NOT broken or a pitiful creature! I used to think he was, but not anymore! I already failed him once when he needed me the most! I know you have powers and I don't, but do you think I care?! I wasn't just going to sit there and let your crazy friend do God knows what to him! It's called being a friend!" Fukiko yelled.

Kyoya smiled gratefully. That did it for him. Fukiko does care about him after all.

Decebal smiled and put his rapier back. "I respect your devotion, little girl. But it won't do you or your pitiful friends any good. Only the strong survive, and the weak die. Don't go through life believing you can change anything. You're a weak little girl who is better off in a life of servitude. The weak should know their place."

"Oh, screw you, broccoli head!" Cure Dusk snapped angrily.

With that, Decebal disappeared into thin air. Right afterward, Fukiko fell to her knees and burst into tears. The kids and fairies could tell why: she's been scared out of her wits this whole time, and even got brutally attacked a couple times. Who wouldn't be after all of that?

"Uuuugh! That guy should be arrested for attempted sexual assault!" Cure Dusk shouted, angry that Zenjin and his adoptive parents got away yet again.

"Fuudo…" Kyoya looked at her with soft, gentle eyes, unlike the scornful looks he always gave her for the past year and a half. He hadn't used that nickname in a long time. He and all of his friends used to call her that ever since they first met. "Thanks for trying to save me. Sorry you got hurt because of it."

Fukiko calmed down a little. "It's okay. I'm just glad I got to save you...and that Riko-chan and the others came when they did."

The girls did double takes. Did she say _'Riko-chan'_?

"Bwahahaha! Who is this Riko you speak of? I'm Cure Twilight, a super hero of epic proportions!" Cure Twilight bellowed.

"You can't fool me. I know it's you, Chino-san, and Asagi-san, Riko-chan. I can recognize your faces and hair styles a mile away," Fukiko deadpanned.

"Ugh…" Riko murmured. She's good. They conceded defeat. "The Sailor Moon girls didn't hide their faces and hairstyles and nobody recognized them!"

"Real life is different from anime, Riko," Hotaru said.

"I promise I won't tell anyone! Really!" Fukiko stammered, feeling guilty about discerning their identities so quickly. Changing back to their civilian forms, Hotaru helped her up.

"Let's get you back home so your parents can take you to a doctor," Hotaru told her.

"Awww! You figured them out?!" Sunbeam complained.

"Yeeek! What the?! Did that plushie just talk?!" Fukiko yelped.

"We're not plushies! We're real life fairies!" Moonbeam added.

"Don't worry. They're friendly," Riko told her. As frazzled as she is, the fairies and their cute appearances did make Fukiko feel a little better.

The kids and fairies decided to head home. What an exhausting yet exciting adventure this was.


	15. Daizo's Dilemma!

Chapter 15: There's Nothing Wrong With Little Sisters! Daizo's Dilemma!

"_Daizo...there's no easy way to say this, but...your sister has brain damage. Something happened during delivery, and as a result, she has some problems we need to work around. But that doesn't mean she isn't capable of doing things like us. She just needs a little bit more support. She's still a part of our family. I hope you understand."_

Those are the words that came out of his parents' mouth when he asked them why his new baby sister-now about 6 months old-isn't behaving the way other babies would. Then again, Funaki Daizo wasn't too keen on having a baby sister at all. He wanted everything to himself. He wanted to do whatever the heck he wanted. He didn't want to have to take care of any babies or share his stuff with them. He figured his new sister will probably slobber all over his stuff, break everything, hog all the attention, make everything hers, or God knows what else.

But something about his new baby sister was different than other babies he's seen. She never splashed or kicked whenever his mother gave her a bath, nor did she seem to drink out of the bottle properly. Not only that, she cried constantly. Every single day. No baby could cry as much as she did. That in itself annoyed Daizo to no end.

However, Daizo's mother told him that his baby sister has brain damage. Ever since he heard the news, he made it a point to either completely disassociate himself from his baby sister in any way, or completely deny her existence everywhere he went, even though his parents always scolded him about it. Not only that, it disgusted him to even look at her. To Daizo, his baby sister isn't a person like he is. In fact, he doesn't even acknowledge her as his sister. To Daizo, she's just brain damaged. His parents would rip him a new one if he was caught saying that, as he learned the hard way, but he didn't care. He didn't care if it was wrong to say those bad things about his sister. Yes, it IS wrong of him to say those things or even think those things.

Daizo didn't want to think about the damage she could do to his reputation if people, especially his friends at school, found out about her, especially if they get older. He didn't think there was any way his friends would want to hang out with someone whose baby sister is disabled.

It's bad enough his best friend is in a wheelchair, as he thought.

Daizo plopped into his room and buried his face in his pillows, wishing that his brain damaged baby sister had never been born. _'She's just gonna ruin everything! Why can't I have a normal sibling, or no siblings at all?! Why can't things go back to the way they were before?!'_ Daizo wailed in his brain but didn't dare do it out loud lest he wake her up, and it was hard enough just to get her to go to sleep.

* * *

The kids felt a little odd ever since Fukiko discovered that they're Pretty Cure and that Kyoya is helping them out. But so far, she hasn't told anyone their secret, thank goodness. Riko sat at her desk reading more of her Pokemon manga until she saw a shadow loom over her.

"Umm...you're Tasogare-san, right?"

She looked up to find a girl about her age looking down at her, but it isn't Yoshie or her clique. Rather, it's the girl named Chinami. Her pale brown hair streamed a little past her chin while most of it went down to the back of her neck. Her eyes are a darker, more chocolatey shade, and under her left eye is a dark brown birthmark that's shaped like a little diamond. She's wearing a dark cotton candy pink short sleeved shirt with the words _'Girls Can Change The World'_ written on them in black and lots of glitter, with a yellow smiley face on it, a darker pink tiered, ruffled skirt that goes slightly above her knees with little bows on both sides, black socks, and twinkle toe shoes that are both dark pink and light pink at the same time, with fake jewels glued on them and a big, tye-dye flower on both sides. She's also wearing a pink, purple, and white bandana around her neck, and little apricot colored rose earrings. She's holding a worksheet in her hands. As much as Riko liked pink, she couldn't help but be a little cowed by all the pink she's wearing, and the fact that she's approaching her at all. Averting eye contact, she replied to her question shyly. "Uhh...yeah?"

"Sorry to bother you, but I hear you're good at English, so I was wondering if you could help me with this," Chinami told her in a nice, pretty, amiable-sounding voice, showing her a worksheet and pointing to a part she hasn't filled in yet. "I'm not understanding this part right here."

Riko looked at the instructions on the worksheet and ruminated. "You're reading it as See-tull. It's pronounced See-Ah-Tull. There's emphasis on the letter A, and it's a short A," Riko explained.

"Ohhhh! I get it! Thanks so much, Tasogare-san!" Chinami exclaimed cheerfully, finally understanding where she went wrong.

In another corner of the classroom, Daizo sat at his desk, joined by a girl with very short, poofy, curly blonde hair that's a darker shade than Anzu's radiant blonde hair and ocean blue eyes like Sunbeam's, along with a boy slightly taller than her with raven black hair like Riko's, only messier, and darker blue eyes. Daizo rolled his eyes. "Tasogare can't be smart. All she does is cry in class, make weird noises, talk about cartoons, and read books for kindergarteners."

"You really shouldn't judge someone just because they're different. We're all different here," The black haired boy told him.

"Yeah, but she's different in a weird way. What kid her age reads kindergarten books? And about a kid's show nobody knows or cares about anymore? And I'm even more surprised that she's able to be friends with Scarface and the blonde goth," The blonde haired girl asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine, Sae," Daizo said to the blonde haired girl, Sae.

"You should be happy they're not bad people," The black haired boy told them.

"Who asked you, Hiroto?" Daizo snapped at Hiroto, who became a little miffed.

Not only that, over the past few days, the kids-Daizo included-noticed something else. They noticed Kyoya and Fukiko actually interacting. Talking to each other in a civil manner. Laughing together. Kyoya even helped Fukiko with some of her math homework in homeroom, and her face lit up like it hadn't been for months. Not only that, during lunch, he saw her sitting alone at another table.

"Hey, Fuudo! Wanna come sit with us?" Kyoya called out, raising his hand so she could see it.

Fukiko whipped her head around the minute she heard her childhood nickname, her hazel eyes wide with surprise. Kyoya's actually inviting her to sit with him? He never did that before. Reluctantly, Fukiko stood up and walked over to them, but she didn't sit with them. Daizo, Hiroto, and Sae watched from another table.

"Are...are you sure? I mean…" Fukiko stammered.

"It's fine. It's no fun sitting alone," Kyoya told her with a merry, radiant smile. Everyone else nodded in agreement. It told the girl all she needed to know. A few days ago, Fukiko wanted to disappear. But now, she doesn't want to trade places with an angel. She sat down in between Marina and Kyoya. The atmosphere at this table felt different from when she sat with Ryoko and her clique. It felt warmer, gentler, happier, and more accepting. It didn't feel superficial or shallow. Fukiko wished she had befriended these kids much earlier, as she felt happier than she ever felt in a long time.

Some people, on the other hand, don't think that way. "Tch. I can't believe Fukiko's hangin' out with the loser league," Daizo sneered before eating some chocolate pocky.

"I don't see anything wrong with it," Hiroto said. "She has the right to choose who she wants to hang out with," He added.

"True," Sae piped in. "But she deserves better."

Daizo doesn't feel motivated to agree with her. His mind is somewhere else. But he did notice that Fukiko looks a lot happier with Kyoya and the others. They talked merrily to each other, waving their arms, laughing at something silly they're talking about while Riko is quietly reading her book, occasionally throwing in a line here and there, enjoying each other's company, etc. In his heart, Daizo is happy for Fukiko. She had been sad for the past few days, and in some way he knew why, but he wanted to wait for her to get over it, since he wasn't sure how he could help her, especially since he has his own problems to deal with.

But although he's happy that Fukiko is back to her old self again, a pang of jealousy began tugging at him. Fukiko doesn't hang out with him anymore. She'd much rather hang out with Kyoya, Riko, Anzu, and Marina than him and his gang. What did they do to deserve her company? As far as Daizo was concerned, all they'd do is cramp her style. He wished he knew the answer, but the truth was, he already knew. He was just in denial about it.

At recess, he noticed Fukiko and Kyoya talking together, laughing merrily. Before he knew it, his jealousy took over, and he found himself stomping toward the two. Kyoya and Fukiko stopped when they saw Daizo come toward them with an oddly contorted face. "Hey, Fukiko. Got a minute?"

Fukiko turned away. "No."

"Hey! I just wanna talk to ya!"

"I'm not interested!"

His temper flared and he grabbed Fukiko's arm roughly. "Hey! What's with you?!"

"You don't deserve to be with these chumps!" Daizo yelled as he tried to drag her away but Kyoya wheeled over and yanked his arm off of her.

"Leave her alone, Daizo!" Kyoya yelled. "You don't decide who she can and can't hang out with!"

"Get outta my face, Four Eyes! She's my friend, not yours!" Daizo yelled.

"I'm done with you!" Fukiko retorted.

Daizo found his teeth grinding, and all of a sudden, he grabbed Kyoya's shirt and pulled him out of his wheelchair. "It's your fault people don't wanna hang out with me anymore!"

"They just don't wanna hang out with a jerk!" Kyoya sneered as he tried to yank his ex-friend off of him. Soon, the two found themselves rolling on the floor, punching each other.

"Stop it, you two! Stop! You'll get in trouble!" Riko was the first to try and break them up. Anzu and Fukiko attempted the same. Riko and Anzu pulled Daizo off while Marina and Fukiko did the same with Kyoya. Kyoya's glasses are out of place, and Daizo has some scabs on his elbows.

"Nobody wants to hang out with a-"

"What's going on here?" A male teacher asked as he arrived on the scene.

"Daizo was being mean to Fukiko and he was trying to beat up Kyo-chan," Riko told him.

"Hey! Don't snitch on me!" Daizo yelled as Kyoya slumped in his wheelchair. The teacher surveyed the messy boys and crossed his arms.

"Both of you. Come with me," The teacher said as he walked toward the bleachers. Reluctantly, Kyoya and Daizo followed him. "I don't know what started this, but you two should know better than to fight on school grounds. It's not nice."

"He started it!" Daizo yelled.

"You started it!" Kyoya snapped.

"It doesn't matter who started it! I can't have you two hacking at each other's throats every time you even so much as make eye contact. You'll both have detention with me next Tuesday," The teacher said.

"But that's no fair!" Daizo complained.

"Quit complaining! You brought it on yourself!" Kyoya added.

"Shut up, you-"

"And don't you dare use any of that ableist language I know you use. You're both on the bleachers for the rest of recess," The teacher told them sternly. Irritably, the two boys sat on the bleachers so they could think about what they've done.

After a while, recess ended, and Daizo was just too happy to be away from his ex-friend. But both he and Kyoya were given detention slips for their parents to sign. Later, in Daizo's eighth period English class...

"Hey, Dai," Hiroto piped in.

"What?"

"Are you free after school?"

"Sorta."

"I was wondering if you'd like to come over and hang out. We never hang out anymore."

"Sure! I'd love to!" Daizo exclaimed, his eyes twinkling brightly with delight. "I have to ask my folks first, but if they say yes, then I'll definitely be there!"

"If you can't come, that's fine. What do your parents do?"

"My dad's a tax lawyer and my mom works at the Sparkle Diner," Daizo replied pertly. "They're hardly ever home, and 'cauze of that, I always have to stay home because I'm not allowed go out when they're not home, and I can't have friends over either. When they're not home, I mean," Daizo didn't dare reveal the real reason why he doesn't want anyone to come over. "I really hate it."

"I know how you feel. I'd love to see your Guitar Hero moves."

Later, when school ended, Daizo found himself walking away from the building, passing the tattoo shop, the police station, and all the other buildings on his street. He turned to glance at the many kids who hopped in their parents' cars, watching them drive away. With a jealous sigh, he continued walking. He wished his parents would pick him up from school, that way he'd be able to get home and play his games earlier. But then again, if they did pick him up by car, he'd have to put up with his baby sister, because they can't leave her at home by herself since Daizo's dad works during the day.

"I don't get why they can't just hire a babysitter," Daizo muttered to himself as that thought ran through his head. At least with walking home, it's quiet and peaceful most of the time. But he couldn't wait to ask his mother whether he could go to Hiroto's or not. Anything to get out of the house for once and hang out with his friends for the first time in a long while.

The only problem is, as soon as he opened the door to his house, the piercing wails of a baby attacked his ear drums, making him cover his ears. Not only that, his mother ran all over the house with the wailing baby in her arms, wearing a face full of worry and exhaustion.

"Noriyuki, do you have the thermometer yet?" The woman asked as she sat down on the couch.

"I can't find it anywhere!" Noriyuki yelped back as he desperately looked through the cabinets. "Oh! Found it!"

"Hey, Mom?" Daizo asked as Noriyuki put the thermometer in the baby's ear. The baby cried even harder and knocked the thermometer out of Noriyuki's hands. He managed to catch it.

"She doesn't like the ear thermometer," Noriyuki mused. "What do we do, Tamiko?"

"Try it again," Tamiko said.

"Hey, Mom!" Daizo yelled.

"Daizo! This is an emergency! Just wait in your room!" Tamiko snapped as Noriyuki finally got the thermometer in the baby's ear. Daizo recoiled a little in response.

The temperature showed up on the thermometer. "Yep, she's got a high fever."

"We'd best take her to the doctor right away," Tamiko said.

"Can't we just give her some medicine?" Noriyuki asked. "I have some in the cabinet."

"Mom! Can I go to Hiroto's house today?" Daizo asked.

"No, Daizo! Your sister needs us here," Tamiko snapped irritably as Noriyuki went to get some medicine from the cabinet.

"But you guys are staying here! Why should I have to stay here and watch her cry all day?!" Daizo yelled, understandably annoyed. "It's not like you two are going out and leaving me alone in the house!"

"Daizo, when I say no, I mean no, and that's final! Your sister's sick and needs our full attention, and her early intervention session is tomorrow morning. Now go upstairs and do your homework," Tamiko snapped.

_Needs our full attention._ Daizo's teeth grinded just hearing that. With a growl, Daizo stomped to the kitchen, got the phone, stomped to his room and slammed the door quite hard, which made the baby cry even harder. "Don't slam the door!" Tamiko yelled from downstairs but Daizo didn't hear. He just dialed Hiroto's phone number.

"Hey dude. It's me. Mom won't let me go to your house," Daizo told him irritably. "Sister's sick."

"_I see. It's okay. We can hang out another time,"_ Hiroto told him reassuringly, but it didn't work.

"I hate this! All I ever do is sit around in the house while Mom and Dad fuss over my sister every single day! They won't even let me go out and have fun anymore! I don't see why I have to be around when she's sick! What can I do?! I get the feeling they wanna keep me in here like some kind of jail!" Daizo complained. "It's not like Dad has to go to work right now, so why couldn't he just drop me off?!"

"_Stuff like that just happens, but I feel you. My older sister gets sick a lot too, and she stays home most of the time. When Mom and Dad are out, I have to take care of her. She gets really bad asthma and if we're not careful she could die. But it'll get better. Maybe not now, but it will later. It's not like complaining's gonna change anything,"_ Hiroto explained.

"Good point. I'll catch you later, okay?"

"_Sure! Later!"_

"Later," With that, Daizo pressed the end button and started on his homework. Unfortunately for Daizo, the homework's proving to be quite tough. It didn't help that some of his notebooks are full of doodles instead of notes, so he can't solve them without the needed equations. He looked through his textbooks, but those equations are just too tough. He wished he could ask Mom and Dad for help, but they're busy with his little sister, and they don't solve the problems the way they're supposed to most of the time.

"Man! I'm gonna fail for sure, and if I get another F on my homework, Mom's gonna flip, and I'll get grounded again!" Daizo complained as he scribbled some hasty answers on his papers. _'I can't let them know I got detention next Tuesday! They'll really blow their top if they find out!'_ Daizo smushed his math homework in his textbook and focused on his English. But that proved to be just as hard.

The wails of his baby sister continued to persist until they suddenly stopped. Daizo heard the beeping of his mother's car, which he could tell meant that she's going out somewhere. Probably to the hospital so his little sister can get taken care of. After a while, Daizo gave up on his homework and just focused on looking at his shiny new baseball cards. He marveled at the players on the cards, and wanted to look at some more until his father came into the room.

"Hey there, Dai," Noriyuki said.

"What is it, Dad?" Daizo asked irritably as he put his cards away.

Noriyuki rubbed his hair with his hand ruefully. "Sorry Tamiko got mad back there. She can be stubborn and cranky sometimes."

"Isn't she always grumpy?" Daizo deadpanned, trapping Noriyuki in place with a glare.

"Now now. Anyway, I asked her if I could take you to Hiroto's house because I have the day off, but she wanted you to focus less on lollygagging and more on your studies. I don't blame her, but I know how hard things have been."

Daizo rolled his eyes. _'Why do you care?'_ Daizo thought bitterly.

A light bulb went off in Noriyuki's head. "I have an idea! Your mother and I are off work tomorrow, so we were planning to go to the aquarium at about one o'clock. Would you like to come?" Noriyuki asked kindly.

"The aquarium?" Daizo wasn't sure how to feel about that, but it'd definitely get him out of the house. Not only that, he liked looking at sharks and their sharp teeth, like the shark from Jaws. He wondered if he'd ever meet a shark as scary as that one. He smiled, the glare in his eyes fading. "Sure. That'd be great."

Noriyuki clasped his hands together and flashed a big, wide smile. "We'll all go together as a family. We haven't been out somewhere in a long time."

Daizo did a double take. "Wait...you don't mean we're taking Kasane with us, are you?"

"Yes."

Daizo stood up from his chair in alarm. "Why?! Why can't you just hire a babysitter and leave her here?! She's just gonna cry all day and make us look bad!" Daizo shouted.

"We don't have the money, and she needs care that most babysitters aren't able to provide," Noriyuki told him. "And I don't want you saying things like that."

"But you know it's true, Dad!" Daizo snapped. "She's just gonna cry and drool all over the place! Isn't that what people like her do all the time?"

Noriyuki stopped being lenient at this point. He put his hands on both of Daizo's shoulders. "Daizo. I don't want you believing that mumbo jumbo. I don't know what you've been watching on TV or hearing in school, but people like Kasane are just as capable of doing things like the rest of us. True, there are some who are very severely disabled, but not all of them are like that, and there are services out there that can help them do things like the rest of us can," Noriyuki told him firmly. "And I certainly don't appreciate you putting your sister down like that. There's nothing we can do to change her. We have to live with it and work around her problems. People like Kasane deserve just as much respect as we do."

"It's always Kasane this, Kasane that! You care way more about her than me! I hate you!" Daizo yelled before storming out of his room.

"Daizo! Come back!" Worried, Noriyuki chased after his son.

* * *

The next day blossomed into a perfectly clear, sunny Saturday morning. The kids and fairies agreed to meet at the park to hang out for a little bit before they go to the aquarium later. Riko brought her Jenga box. But before they did anything, they decided to fill Fukiko in on everything that's been going on, from Rozaniela's destruction to her encounter with Zenjin.

"My gosh! That's terrible!" Fukiko exclaimed upon hearing everything. "But how come you guys haven't found him yet? Doesn't he have some kind of secret hideout?" She asked.

"We know he does, but we don't know of any way to find it," Moonbeam told her ruefully, scratching one of her long ears.

"There's also the fact that he's extremely tight lipped about everything he and his lackeys do, so it's no use trying to make him spill his guts," Anzu piped in.

"True that," Marina agreed.

"How's your head?" Kyoya asked, noting the gauze on Fukiko's head.

"This? The doctor said I'm okay," Fukiko said calmly at first. "But I'm sure as heck never gonna go out without an alarm on my backpack!" She shouted.

"Aren't those things expensive?" Riko asked.

"Not really," Hotaru said. "Backpacks with alarms on them are actually reasonably priced."

"Where's Starbeam at? Isn't she supposed to be here by now?" Lovebeam asked as she took a bite out of Sunbeam's freshly baked cookies.

"She said she's going to try and contact your parents and conduct some studies about Earth," Hotaru said. "She'll be fine."

"Do you guys wanna play Jenga now? It's really fun!" Riko said as she opened the box and already began setting up some blocks.

"I haven't played that in a long while!" Fukiko said as she helped stack some blocks on the block tower.

"Oh! Oh! Can I play?" Sunbeam asked.

"Sure! This'll be a four on four battle!" Kyoya exclaimed.

* * *

With a notebook and pen in hand, Starbeam floated in front of a withered cherry blossom tree, writing down her findings. "So, cherry blossoms are part of the genus Prunus, and this one is a prunus campanulata. Their leaves commonly contain coumarin, which is harmless in general but toxic in large doses. If I ever see Father again, he'll most certainly love to make use of this information," Starbeam said.

She sat down on some bricks, pulled out a big piece of paper, and began writing on it.

**Dear Mother and Father**

**This is Starbeam. How are you doing? I hope you're alright. My sisters and I are finally together again after so long. We're on Earth right now, and so far, everything has been fine.**

Starbeam wrote about the Pretty Cure, Zenjin's evil deeds, Decebal's involvement, and some things about Earth, such as how technologically advanced it is compared to Rozaniela. But she made sure not to paint that last part as a bad thing. She continued writing.

**When will we be able to see you again? I understand that you're busy with your work, especially with Rozaniela's current situation. We don't want to get in your way, and it's great to know that you're alive and well. But we miss you so, and we'd very much like to see your faces again and hug you and be with you, even if it's just for a short while. Let us know soon! We love you! 3**

**Sincerely,**

**Starbeam**

Starbeam drew some little hearts and moons around the letter. She always does that whenever she's writing something. She folded the letter neatly and put it in her bow clip. "Oh! Everyone's at the park today! I should probably get going," Starbeam flew toward the park with a light heart. She was a little far from it, but she didn't mind. Floating around the neighborhood proved to be quite relaxing, especially on sunny days like this. It was always nice to look at the trees, the squirrels scuttling about, the birds twittering and singing their lovely songs, and soaking up the spring sunshine.

However, she didn't get to go far because some crows saw her bow clip glint under the sunlight, and crows love anything that's shiny. One crow leaped off of some electrical lines and darted right toward Starbeam. "Cawwww!"

"Oh my!" Upon hearing the crow's loud cry, Starbeam spun around, managing to evade its long beak. But she knew she wasn't out of the woods. Two others crows joined it in trying to peck at her and grab the clip on her ribbon. Starbeam covered her bow clip with her stubby little arms and evaded their beaks as much as possible. But it didn't help that the crows were unrelentingly persistent and just wouldn't leave her alone.

"Get back! Go away! Leave me be, you naughty crows!" Starbeam fired some small spheres of blue light at them. She kept them small so they wouldn't do any damage to them or hurt them, just enough to make them get the message and go away. Unfortunately for Starbeam, the crows didn't get the message. One crow managed to clench its beak right on one of Starbeam's round ears.

"Ohhh!" Starbeam yelped as the crow's sharp beak clenched her ear, sending jolts of pain throughout her head. But she remained calm enough to retaliate. "Leave me alone!" Her green eyes glinting with anger and courage, Starbeam valiantly slapped the crow right in the face. Her slap was so strong it made the crow release her from its beak. One crow managed to poke Starbeam's stomach, leaving a red mark. Another crow bit down on Starbeam's thin tail. Starbeam kicked that crow in the face, making it release her, but her tail throbbed in pain, and she didn't like how it felt.

Using all the strength she could muster, she flew faster than the crows and into a small bush next to a tree. The crows didn't seem to see her dive in there, and kept looking around. Starbeam kept her hands over her bow clip, hoping they wouldn't see it. But she saw an opening in the bushes and watched the crows closely; their bobbing heads, their long beaks, their twiggy legs, their shimmering black feathers. Eventually, one of the crows cawed and all three of them flew away.

Starbeam fell on her rear and exhaled a huge sigh of relief. "Phew...they're gone at last," Starbeam took in some extra breath before venturing out of the bush, since the coast was clear. But when she got out, she looked around curiously, perplexed with the fact that she was now in an area she doesn't recognize. She was still in Hikaribashi, but she had never come to this part of the neighborhood before. So how far is she from the park? She couldn't help but wonder if her sisters and friends were getting worried. But as much as she'd like to get to them, both her ear and tail throbbed with pain, and it didn't help that one of the crows left a fresh peck mark on her side. Some blood trickled out a little bit, but nothing fatal. Nevertheless, Starbeam needed to tend to these wounds, or they could get infected.

Much to her relief, she found herself near a house. One of the windows was open. Using her strength, she flew to the open window and crawled inside. She wanted to close the window, as whenever she and her family would leave the house they would always make sure the windows were closed so nobody could get in, but if she did someone would notice, so she chose not to. She saw an oven-stove combo, some cabinets, a sink, and a microwave, so she came to the conclusion that she was in the kitchen. Starbeam looked through some cabinets, hoping to find some gauze and disinfectants.

'_I apologize for going through your things like this. I promise I'll put everything back when I'm done with them. I just need to tend to my wounds and that'll be it,'_ Starbeam told herself as she looked through some cabinets. Her conscious was nagging at her to quit going through someone else's things. But what else could she do? She can't use the ComLap because it only works in different dimensions, not the same one, and she doesn't have any of the walkie talkies she and her sisters used to play with when they were young. They'd be very convenient by now.

Starbeam did grab some paper towels, turn on the sink, and get them wet. Once they were cold, wet, and damp, she placed it on her side. The wound on her side burned a little upon making contact with the damp cloth, causing the blue fairy to grimace. But she knew she had to endure it so the wound could at least be cleaned and cooled down a little. After that, she threw the wet paper towel in the nearest trash can. She found some band-aids and very slowly and gently put a big one on her side. She pressed on it firmly so it'd stay on. Thankfully, the water didn't make the band-aid come off, and it stayed on her side. Starbeam let out a sigh of relief.

After that, Starbeam cleaned up the small mess she made using some more paper towels. She knew it wouldn't be very considerate of her to just leave a mess like that, and it would certainly either give her away or imply that someone in the house did it before they left. She didn't want that to happen to her or whoever might get blamed for it. After she threw the paper towels away, she flew into the living room and sat on the couch.

"If I get lost, I have to stay in one place," Starbeam told herself. She and her sisters can sense each others' presences, both outside and inside. If she were in a house and her sisters were outside, they could still sense her. But she did notice a phone in the kitchen. She could use it to contact Riko and the others! But she knew they were at the park right now and wouldn't be home, and she forgot what Hotaru's cell phone number was. Not only that, she didn't know the address of the house she's currently in. But she knew she had to do something.

But before she could leave the couch, the front door open. Starbeam went into stuffed animal mode, praying that whoever just came in won't notice her.

Funaki Daizo entered his house before anyone else. Starbeam watched as he quickly stormed up the stairs. A crumpled up paper flew out of his pocket, rolling down the stairs. A man came into the house next, along with a woman carrying a sleeping baby. The woman went upstairs to put the baby in her crib while the man was about to sit on the couch. He stopped when he saw Starbeam lying on the cushion.

He gently picked her up, walked upstairs, walked into the baby's room, and gently put Starbeam in the pink, wooden baby crib, right next to the sleeping baby. He smiled and left the room. The coast was clear. Starbeam found it safe to move. But she turned around to look at the pudgy baby sleeping right next to her, with her plump cheeks, her soft skin, her weak little fists, and the cute, pink onesie she was wearing.

'_So this is what a human infant looks like. She's adorable,'_ Starbeam thought to herself, gently stroking the sleeping baby's fist. But she stopped when she heard the baby moan a little bit, quickly going into stuffed animal mode. The baby's chocolate brown eyes are wide open. But she did glance at the name written on the baby's onesie. It was written in Katakana, and Starbeam studied some of it with Hotaru, so she was able to read the baby's name. "Ka-sa-ne. So you're Kasane-chan. Salutations. It's a pleasure to get acquainted with you," Starbeam said gently.

The baby turned around to face Starbeam. She stared at her for a little bit before flashing a big, toothless, gummy smile. Starbeam smiled back.

She wanted to get acquainted with Kasane some more, but the door opened, and Starbeam was forced back into stuffed animal mode again. Daizo came into the room, putting a bag of clean diapers next to the changing table. He was about to leave until Kasane began making babbling noises. He stopped and turned around. Kasane held her chubby arms out, reaching for the ceiling with a big, gummy smile on her face, making babbling noises.

Something awakened within Daizo, and he was helpless to resist. He walked over to his baby sister and looked down at her. Upon seeing Daizo, Kasane smiled even wider, waving her little arms at him like she was saying, _"Pick me up! I wanna play with you!"_ Daizo looked around the room. Nobody was around. He tried holding the baby before, but his mother scolded him and acted like he robbed a bank. But he wanted to try it again. Maybe he'd get it right this time. Slowly, he reached down and very gently pulled the baby out of her crib. He made sure to put one hand underneath her head to support it. His mother yelled at him about that once. Once he had the baby in his arms, he sat down in front of the crib. He didn't want to hold her while standing. He was afraid he would drop her.

Kasane smiled even wider upon making contact with Daizo's chest. For a moment, Daizo was afraid she'd slobber all over it, but she didn't. She just smiled and cooed. Starbeam rolled herself over to watch. She wanted to see how he'd handle being with his sister. As soon as Kasane cooed, Daizo's normally sullen expression softened. Perhaps babies do have their good points, and he had to admit, he liked Kasane when she wasn't being annoying. He smiled at her.

"We're going to the aquarium later," Daizo told Kasane. He didn't say it in a cutesy voice like his mother would use. That'd be embarrassing. He just talked to her like he'd usually talk to someone, but he knew he had to keep his voice soft and gentle or he'd scare her. He didn't want to scare her or make her cry, even if she is normally very fussy. "There's a lot of fish there. Starfish, seahorses, seals, sea lions, sharks, sting rays...hey, all of those start with the letter S. That's kinda funny, don't you think?" Daizo found himself chuckling a little.

Kasane watched him with interested eyes, like she wanted to hear more. "You'd probably hate the sharks. They're pretty scary, and if you go near them they'll bite you so hard you get chomped in half. But sharks don't scare me. To be honest...I find jellyfish scarier than sharks," Daizo told her. He grimaced a little and found himself shivering. "Ugh, there was one time when we went to the beach, and I stepped on a jellyfish that was on the shore and I got electrocuted. My dad managed to make it better thanks to all that vinegar and sea water he poured on it, but man! I'm never going near a jellyfish ever again. I know they're pretty, but man do they sting! You'd be done for if a jellyfish stung you."

Kasane said nothing. She continued to stare at him with those curious eyes of hers. Starbeam smiled, happy that he's trying to make some connection with his sister. Daizo rolled his eyes. _'I can't believe I'm actually doing this. Then again...she actually listens,'_ Daizo thought, perplexed at the fact that he's trying to connect with his baby sister of all people.

Downstairs, Noriyuki was about to go upstairs until he noticed a crumpled up paper at the bottom of the stairs. "Oh, Daizo. You shouldn't leave your trash lying around," Noriyuki grumbled, smoothing out the paper. But he stopped when he saw the words _'Detention Slip,'_ on the paper in bold black letters. Concerned, he slowly walked upstairs. He heard Daizo's voice coming from the baby's room. He stopped at the door upon seeing Daizo sitting on the floor, holding Kasane in his arms.

"When you get older, I'm gonna show you the awesomeness of Otogi Jingi. He's one of the best baseball players around, and I have a ton of cards of him!" Daizo told her. He looked up and saw Noriyuki at the door with a smile on his face.

Daizo turned red. "What...are you doing here?" Daizo grumbled, looking away. _'Darn! I can't believe he saw me! Ugh!'_

Noriyuki came into the room. "Sorry, Dai. Do you have a minute?" Noriyuki told him softly. Daizo very slowly stood up and put Kasane back in her crib as gently as he could. Kasane made some more babbling noises and didn't seem perturbed in any way. Daizo and Noriyuki left the room and closed the door.

"So what's up?" Daizo asked, his smile fading.

"I hate to do this, but...I saw this on the floor," Noriyuki pulled the detention slip out of his pocket and showed it to Daizo.

As soon as he saw it, Daizo facepalmed. "Urrgh! You weren't supposed to find out!" He grumbled in a low voice.

"Would you like to tell me what this is about?" Noriyuki asked kindly.

Daizo turned away. "It's nothing."

"Daizo-" Noriyuki wanted to continue this in a calm way, but Tamiko suddenly marched right in, her hair scraggly and her eyes a little baggy. Not even her huge amounts of pink eye shadow could mask how tired she looked.

"Noriyuki, what have I told you about-" Tamiko was about to scold him on something until she saw the paper. She took it out of Noriyuki's hand and read it. As soon as she finished reading, the exhaustion in her eyes morphed into anger. The bags under her eyes now looked out of place. "Daizo! What is this all about?!"

"Shhhh!" Daizo hissed. "You'll wake her up."

"I demand an explanation!" Tamiko shouted, paying him no heed.

"It's nothing, really," Daizo told her sheepishly.

"Detention next Tuesday? For fighting?! This isn't nothing, Daizo, and neither is fighting at school!" Tamiko roared, completely ignoring how loud her voice is. Already, Daizo could hear moans coming from the baby's room.

Daizo tried to walk away, but Tamiko grabbed his arm quite roughly. "Daizo! Listen to me for once!"

"No! I listen to you all the time! Whenever I want you to listen to me you don't even know I'm there! All you do is get mad at everything now! I can't even go hang out with my friends anymore! Why don't you listen to ME for once?!" Daizo snapped, finally losing all control.

"Have you ever considered that your bad attitude may be the reason you can't hang out with your friends? For that matter you don't even treat your friends right! You discarded Kyoya-kun just because he's in a wheelchair, and behavior like that is not acceptable!"

"With you, everything's not acceptable!"

"Don't take that tone with me, young man! You need to learn to take responsibility for your actions and stop being so selfish! Blaming others for things you do isn't going to fix anything! You should know better than this!"

"Tamiko, calm down. I don't think-" Noriyuki tried to mediate the tension between them, but Daizo just ran to his room and slammed the door so hard it made everyone grimace.

"Stop slamming the doors, Daizo! What's it going to take for you to listen?!" Tamiko roared. Daizo could hear the baby wailing.

"What's it gonna take for YOU to listen?! I'm sick of you harping on everything I do!" Daizo roared without opening his door. He threw himself on his bed and buried his face in his pillow. He wished he was at Hiroto's house.

* * *

"How come Starbeam's not here yet?" Riko asked curiously.

The kids and fairies looked around. She was right. Starbeam hasn't shown up. "She's never late," Moonbeam said, smoothing out her ribbon.

"You don't think something happened, do you?" Fukiko asked.

"I don't think so. How about this? We'll go and find her. She's probably sitting in front of a plant and studying it," Sunbeam said.

"Will you? We'd appreciate it," Kyoya told them.

"We'll be back soon, okay?" Lovebeam said as she, Moonbeam, and Sunbeam flew away to try and find their sister.

They looked around various parts of the neighborhood, but Starbeam wasn't anywhere in sight. But Moonbeam's ears twitched when she passed by a certain street. "I can sense Starbeam's presence down there," Moonbeam said, pointing to the street in question. The fairies changed direction and looked around.

"Anything new?" Sunbeam asked.

"Yep! Her presence is getting stronger!" Lovebeam exclaimed.

"It's coming from that house over there!" Moonbeam pointed to a white and grey house nearby.

The fairies flew to the house in question, but they didn't go in right off. They saw Tamiko washing dishes. Her face was pinched up, and the bags under her eyes were dark. Her hair was scraggly and unkempt, and she kept bending over, rubbing her back with her hand. The fairies decided to fly to another window. It led to Daizo's room. Daizo's window wasn't open, and he kept his angry face buried in his pillows. The fairies flew to the window next to his room. It overlooked the baby's room.

Starbeam felt her ears twitch. She turned around to find all three of her sisters smiling at her from the window. Quietly, she flew over to the window, undid the lock, and pulled it open. Since she was so small, it proved to be quite heavy. But her sisters helped her open it from the outside, and up went the window. "My dear sisters. You've come to help me. I do apologize for making you worry," Starbeam told them in a low whisper.

"Why are we whispering?" Sunbeam asked out loud.

"Shhh! The baby is sleeping. She was crying earlier and Tamiko just put her back to sleep," Starbeam clarified. Sunbeam put her hands over her mouth.

"A human baby? Can we see?" Lovebeam asked, her lavender eyes twinkling with curiosity.

"Sure. But you must be quiet or she'll wake up again," Starbeam told her.

All four fairies flew over to the now sleeping baby. Sunbeam found herself smitten. "Awww! She's so cute!" Sunbeam crooned in a low whisper.

"She certainly is, isn't she?" Lovebeam agreed.

"So this is what a human baby looks like. I've never seen one before," Moonbeam whispered.

"Her name is Kasane," Starbeam whispered.

"They named their kid umbrella sound?" Sunbeam asked.

"We'd best leave this instant. Our friends may worry," Starbeam said, gesturing for the girls to fly out the window. When they got out, they closed the window. They couldn't lock it from the outside so they had to hope that the baby would be okay with it just being closed.

"So what made you come here?" Lovebeam asked.

"I meant to meet with you, but some crows attacked me. See? I have a wound here," Starbeam explained, showing them the band-aid on her side. "I needed to tend to my injuries, so I had to sneak in here and go through their cabinets. I apologize."

"It's okay! We're just glad you're okay!" Moonbeam took Starbeam by the arm. "Come on! Our friends are waiting!"

Starbeam nodded and they flew away.

* * *

Kyoya and his family arrived at the Tasogare house to pick Riko up. Riko met up with Kyoya in front of his father's van and got in first. She was surprised to find that Kyoya's van not only had enough room for his wheelchair, but had an actual wheelchair lift. As soon as the van drove away from the house, Riko found herself chatting with Kyoya throughout the entire ride, setting her heart aglow with happiness. She handed him her copy of Comet In Moominland.

Soon, they arrived at the aquarium, where they were met with nearly every single underwater creature known to man. Sharks, seals, starfish, seahorses, whales, stingrays, jellyfish, octopus, piranhas, penguins, etc. The whole place was an entire museum of underwater creatures. Riko and Kyoya were rapt.

"Jellyfish are so beautiful! Those stringy things they have look like the veil of a wedding dress!" Someone dressed in odd, flashy hippie clothes shouted next to Riko, which made her cover her ears. Riko looked up at the pig tailed person wearing star shaped glasses, a sleeveless top, bandanas, long jeans, and high heels. She then turned back to the jellyfish. She had to admit, the flashy looking lady is right in that their transparent, gelatinous, trailing tentacles are flowing gracefully, just like wedding veils.

"Yeah. They really are," Riko mused under her breath. She then looked up at the hippie lady. "Hey! Have you seen moon jellyfish? They glow in the dark depending on the color of the light people put on! They kinda look like really glowy, fluffy fairies."

"Really?" The flashy woman asked, her eyes sparkling with curiosity despite it being so dark. "Where are they?"

"Just back there," Riko pointed to the area behind the hippie lady.

"Thanks!" The woman said before darting off to fangirl over the cute little moon jellyfish. "Awww! They're so cute!"

In spite of how loud it was, Riko did manage to hear someone familiar complaining a little ways from her. "Come on! I don't wanna see the jellyfish! They're freaky looking! I wanna see the sharks already!"

"Be patient, Daizo! Maybe Kasane wants to see them!" Tamiko shouted. Kasane immediately began moaning. Riko covered her ears and made a dash for it.

Later on, Riko, Kyoya, and his parents went to see the penguins. Riko liked how slippery they look, their long beaks, their big, white, egg-shaped bellies, and the graceful way they swam through the water so seamlessly without difficulty. But she does wonder how they're able to keep their eyes open while underwater. Riko could never keep her eyes open underwater, because the water would make her eyes feel like they're drowning, and who knows what kind of illness-inducing substances could get in.

"Hiya, Riko!" Upon hearing her name, Riko turned around to find Marina and Anzu standing right behind her with jovial looks on their faces. Marina is wearing a long sleeved, bright, sunny yellow sweater, a pair of blue jeans, and brown boots while Anzu is wearing a black hoodie over a red shirt with a white circle that has a yellow lightning bolt on it, black bondage pants with orange stitching, and purple tennis shoes. Sunbeam and Starbeam are with them.

"Mari-chan! An-chan!" Riko exclaimed happily as she hugged them both. "Glad you could make it!"

"I hitched a ride with Mari here because my dad had to work," Anzu explained. "I really miss going to aquariums. They're like a whole new world for us humans."

"I know, right?" Kyoya piped in cheerfully. "Have you seen the sharks yet? They're so cool!"

"I love sharks! They show no mercy attacking their prey! And no, I wasn't the least bit freaked out by Jaws," Marina piped in enthusiastically, which made everyone laugh merrily.

"Me either," Anzu piped in.

"I like the angelfish best. They look so graceful and elegant when swimming," Lovebeam threw in dreamily.

"Did you know that sharks fear dolphins?" Starbeam asked.

"Oh! I see some pretty fish over there!" Riko said before darting off. Anzu, Marina, and Kyoya followed her, along with Kayoko and Jiroemon, who smiled upon seeing the kids having a good time. The kids found themselves rapt by the little seahorses and the graceful way they swam up and down.

"Seahorses are so cute," Moonbeam said, awed by the little seahorses.

"You can say that again," A voice behind them said. The kids turned around to find Hotaru behind them, wearing a short sleeved white shirt with lots of midnight blue stars on it in many sizes, along with a medium length maroonish purple skirt, tall black socks, and light brown boots.

"Hi, Hotaru-chan!" Riko exclaimed cheerfully.

"Jeez, everyone's here today," Kyoya said.

"My parents thought it'd be a great day to come. I'll introduce you," Hotaru told them politely as she escorted them to her male parents. "These are my two fathers, Sojiro and Kyouichi. Dad and Kyouichi, these are my friends, Tasogare Riko-san, Mitomo Kyoya-san, Chino Anzu-san, and Asagi Marina-san. Riko is Hikage's sister."

"It's so nice to meet you all. Hotaru's told us a lot about you," Kyouichi told them cheerfully and shook Anzu's hand. Marina just stood there dumbfounded while Riko shyly hid behind Kyoya, not because she was cowed by the fact that Hotaru's parents are both male. She had known that for a long time. But she was still not very good at socializing with new people. Soon, Kayoko and Jiroemon introduced themselves to Sojiro and Kyouichi. Later on, they all decided to go to the gift shop. Not all of them, though.

"Hey, Dad. Do you mind if I go to the bathroom real quick?" Kyoya asked.

"Sure. I don't mind. But don't be gone too long, and meet us back here when you're done," Jiroemon told him.

"I need to go, too," Riko chimed in as she followed Kyoya, who didn't mind her company. In fact, he preferred her company out of everyone else in his school, including Anzu. He had to wonder why he had never befriended Anzu before.

But as soon as they got close to the bathroom, they heard yelling nearby. Riko was quick to cover her ears, and they both stopped to wait it out. But they couldn't help but overhear what was going on. "Come on, Mom! We can't leave now! We haven't even seen the sharks yet!" That voice belonged to Daizo.

"Daizo, enough is enough! Kasane needs a doctor right away!" Tamiko snapped back.

"It's JUST a fever! You're paranoid! She just needs medicine, that's all!"

"No she doesn't, Daizo!" This is when Kasane began wailing. Noriyuki took Kasane out of Tamiko's arms and happily rocked her back and forth while singing a lullaby, ignoring the argument.

"And even if she is sick, why can't you go while Dad and I stay here? I don't see why you have to drag us around or keep us somewhere every time Kasane gets sick!"

"How do I know you're not going to do something stupid like get in a fight with someone?"

"Is that ALL you care about anymore?! Kasane and me doing stupid stuff?! You wonder why I hate you! All you ever do anymore is get mad and yell, and every time I need you for something it's always Kasane this, Kasane that! Just because she's brain damaged doesn't mean she needs you constantly smothering her twenty four seven! And worst of all, every time she DOES get sick you act like everyone absolutely HAS to be around! I don't even get to hang out with my friends anymore! It's not that hard to hire babysitters or get some help, Mom!"

"Daizo, don't take that tone with me! I'm sick of that attitude of yours! You need to stop being selfish, and stop yelling! You're making the baby cry even more!"

"You know what?! YOU'RE the one who's selfish! I'm sick of you acting like everybody has to just drop everything and shower you with help and pity just because Kasane is sick! You know what? I take back everything I said about Kasane! YOU'RE the one who's ruining my life!" With that rhetoric, Daizo stormed off. Tamiko ran after him, but he was too far away for her to catch up.

Riko and Kyoya looked at each other with confused faces. "I didn't know Daizo had a baby sister," Kyoya said.

"Me either," Riko said before going into the bathroom. The baby's wails finally ceased. Kyoya went in the bathroom as well. When he finished, he found Noriyuki sitting on a chair, playing with Kasane quite cheerfully.

"Oh! Kyoya-kun! It's been so long!" Noriyuki exclaimed happily.

"Uh, Hi...Funaki-san," Kyoya replied sheepishly.

"How are you? Are your parents with you?"

"Yeah."

Riko came out of the bathroom and saw Kyoya and Noriyuki talking. "Is that your daughter?" Kyoya asked.

"Yep. This is Kasane. Oh, um…" Noriyuki's face donned a remorseful look. "Listen, I'm sorry for what Daizo's done to you. It was wrong of him to cut you off because of the accident. Tamiko and I scolded him harshly about it, but he hasn't listened. But...he seems to be learning his lesson. I saw him with Kasane here, and at first, he wanted nothing to do with her. But he was nice to her and was telling her about the aquarium," Noriyuki took Kasane's little hands in his and played with her. "I want him to accept people's differences and love people for who they are, and not shun them because of things they can't control."

"I kinda overheard that argument earlier."

"Oh that? Sorry. Tamiko and Daizo haven't been getting along lately, and...to be honest, I agree with Daizo. Ever since Kasane was diagnosed, Tamiko acts like all she needs is constant care and protection. I don't want her to fight Kasane's battles. I know lots of people who are like Kasane, and they're very capable of taking care of themselves. True, Kasane does have some obstacles she needs to overcome, and there are areas she may need help with, but she can still do some things on her own. She's made a lot of progress in these past few months, with more to come. But...Daizo's my son, too, and I feel bad that he hasn't been able to do what he wants, like hang out with his friends."

"I see."

"I hope you understand, Kyoya-kun."

"I do. Thanks for talking with me."

"Not a problem. There are some things I need to fix as well. I need to be a bit more assertive and confident. We all have things we need to work around."

Kyoya smiled in agreement. "Yeah."

"I'll see you later," Noriyuki stood up with Kasane in his big arms and walked away. Kasane made some happy babbling noises. She looked at Kyoya and flailed her arm up and down, like she was trying to wave at him. Kyoya waved back and Kasane flashed a big, gummy smile.

* * *

In another bathroom, Daizo punched a wall and kicked a trash can over. Some of its contents spilled right out, like some candy wrappers and a broken souvenir. His hand pulsated painfully after he punched the stone hard wall, but he didn't care. He slumped against the wall and slowly fell on his rear end. He stared up at the fluorescent lights on the ceiling, wishing everything was different. He wished his mother wasn't so uptight and snippy.

But he had to admit, his perception of Kasane changed quite a bit...and Kyoya as well. Months ago, Daizo would jeer at anyone who had any kind of disability, convinced that they were completely incapable of anything. But now, Daizo wondered if he really was wrong to think like that. Just earlier, he saw someone with a prosthetic leg happily chatting with his friends, and they acted like the prosthetic wasn't a big deal.

Kyoya entered his mind. Daizo saw Kyoya do lots of things, even though he's in a wheelchair. Daizo facepalmed. Kyoya is still the person he knew and loved. But Daizo cast him aside just because of something that wasn't his fault. He knew about the accident. But he didn't think about Kyoya's feelings. Daizo was just concerned about his own disgust at Kyoya's using a wheelchair. How could he have been so cruel? Daizo wished he could turn back time and stop himself from being so stupid.

Confused and conflicted, Daizo stepped out of the bathroom. He saw his sister's stroller nearby and was about to approach her with open arms, only to wind up bumping into someone. He looked up to find an indigo haired woman with pinkish red, star shaped glasses, wearing lots of bandanas, a tank top, long jeans, and high heels. She looked like a hippie who popped right out of the 1960s.

"You should say excuse me when you bump into someone!" The indigo haired woman scolded.

"It's your own fault! You need to watch where you're going, you hobo!" Daizo yelled.

A vein popped in the woman's head. "I am NOT a hobo! Ooooh! Now you're gonna get it, you little brat!" The indigo haired woman snapped her fingers, which made a wall appear behind him. He tried to run for his life, but glowing ropes wrapped around his wrists and ankles, pulling him to the wall. Right after that, a Soul Portal appeared. The indigo haired woman peered into his Soul Portal, causing Daizo to scream and wail in his loudest voice possible. Nobody was around to hear him, so nobody came to his rescue. Soon, the indigo haired woman yanked out a glass orb, and it turned black. She threw it to the ground, where it grew bigger and morphed into a pitch black, normal sized rhinoceros.

"I thought he'd turn into something nicer, like a cheetah or a monkey. Oh well," The indigo haired woman said as she casually walked away from the scene without a second thought. The rhinoceros bellowed and began ramming into fish tanks, causing the glass to break and the water within them to come spilling out. People took their children and ran as fast as they could. Some got caught in the raging waters. One person got electrocuted by a jellyfish. Another had a piranha biting his hair.

"What is that?!" Kyoya asked.

Water came into the room. Not too much, but it came all the way to their feet. The fairies immediately made a bubble around Kyoya and lifted him and his wheelchair upward, away from the water. Electric wheelchairs and water don't mix, so that was a good move on their part. "Thanks, girls," He told them gratefully.

"You're welcome!" Moonbeam chirped. Right after that, a black rhinoceros bellowed and broke another fish tank, sending water all over the place. The girls were quick to transform.

"Pretty Cure, let the light shine!" After transforming, the girls used light beams to make a big hole in the roof, big enough for them to get the black rhino out of there. They managed to grab the rhino, but it struggled to get out of their grasp. Cure Twilight has its tail, Dawn and Dusk it's belly, and Starlight it's horn. The wings on their shoes turned big, and they flew through the roof with the rhinoceros in their hands. Kyoya and the fairies were about to follow them until they heard the vociferous sound of a baby crying.

Daizo's body, Soul Portal exposed for the world to see and infiltrate, and the baby stroller containing his wailing sister, both floated on the water.

"Daizo! Hurry and save them! Come on!" Kyoya exclaimed. The bubble flew over to them and Kyoya, with all the strength he could muster, pulled them both inside the bubble. After that, the fairies flew through the hole.

They managed to find an open area surrounded by trees, with no buildings or people within the vicinity, which made it safe for them to launch whatever attacks they could use on it. Cure Twilight started off with a Twilight Sparkle attack, but the rhinoceros kept on dodging the glowing boomerang and knocked the cat girl into a tree.

Cure Dawn unleashed a Dawn Slam on it, managing to make it stumble a little, but it regained its footing and charged at her. Cure Dusk swooped down, grabbed it's horn, and tried to push it back. When that didn't work, she lifted it up like it was a bag of sweets and threw it into some trees, causing them to break beneath its weight.

"_I'm sick of my mom...all she cares about is Kasane...she acts like I'm not even there anymore!"_ The black rhinoceros bellowed as it charged at Cures Dawn and Dusk. Thankfully, both girls jumped out of the way and landed some punches on its back, not that they did any good.

Cure Twilight unleashed an unusually strong Twilight Serenade attack on it. It managed to knock it over, but what the girls noticed is that the hippie girl just barely managed to evade it.

"Can you girls, like, watch it with the attacks? You almost made me flat as a pancake!" The indigo haired hippie woman exclaimed.

"Who the heck are you?!" Cure Dusk yelped.

"Um, like, my name is Beileag, but I'd appreciate it if you call me either Billie or B-chan. So you're the Pretty Cure, huh? I do love your fashion sense, but don't you think you should let up on those attacks of yours? That's my creation you're messing with," Beileag told them casually.

"So you corrupted Daizo's soul and turned him into a Corrupt Sentinel?! That means you work for Zenjin, don't you?!" Cure Starlight said as she pulled out her naginata and smacked the rhino over the head with it.

"Corrupt Sentinel? Oooh! Now THAT is a good name for them! I never did like the whole Human Trash gig. I tried to make him go with something cooler, but he tries to blow me up every time I even so much as bring up the subject!" Beileag said as Cure Dusk unleashed a Dusk Medley on the rampaging rhino. But it knocked all of her fiery musical notes away and knocked her on the grass.

"Dusk!" Cure Twilight exclaimed as she tried to punch the rhino, but it rammed it's body against her, throwing her on the grass as well.

"Starlight Shower!" Cure Starlight unleashed a rain shower of stars, falling on the black rhinoceros and causing it to roar.

"_I wish she'd stop acting like the whole world revolves around Kasane! Let her fight her own battles for once! There ARE things Kasane can do on her own! She does need help sometimes, but not ALL the time!"_ The rhinoceros roared as it rammed into some trees, almost trapping Cure Dawn had she not flown out of the way.

"Golden Dusk Explosion!" Cure Dawn slammed her nunchucks on the rhino and caused a large, yellow explosion all throughout the area. It didn't knock over any trees, which is good, but it barely managed to leave some marks on the rhinoceros. It charged at Cure Twilight, but she managed to grip its horn and stop it from going any further.

"Twilight! Be careful!" Kyoya exclaimed with worry.

"Daizo-kun...I'm glad you're finally starting to understand…" Cure Twilight hissed as she kept an iron grip on the rhino's horn. "I just want to tell you...if your sister ever gets bullied and picked on for her problems...like I was…" Some images of Riko being cornered by some kids and a teacher flashed through her mind, but she ignored them. "Be there for her! Help her out when she DOES need you! You don't want her to get picked on because of something she can't help, do you?"

"_I...I didn't think about that...but no. She doesn't deserve that,"_ The rhino replied. Cure Twilight couldn't believe it was answering her.

Twilight smiled. "Good! You love her! That's a start! Be a big brother to her when all this is over!" With that, Cure Twilight threw the rhinoceros at another set of trees, causing some birds to fly away. Daizo's baby sister continued to cry, but Cure Twilight tried to pay no attention, even though she wants nothing more than to cover her ears and run away. However, super heroes don't do that. Even she knew that much. Super heroes always right the wrongs of others, even if they're scared and want to run away and hide.

"You really have to hit them hard! Rhino skin is extremely thick, and they're pretty stupid so they'll do the same thing over and over again!" Kyoya shouted.

"Alrighty then! Get a load of this! Mandarin Dusk Inferno!" Without any mercy or restraint, Cure Dusk unleashed a huge tornado of hot, glowing, orange flames on the rhinoceros, which bellowed and roared like it was in excruciating pain.

"Jeez. Talk about overdoing it," Beileag said, a little cowed by Cure Dusk's strength and lack of restraint. "Seriously, she'll set the forest on fire!"

"Ready for the obligatory finisher move, girls?" Cure Starlight asked. The girls nodded and joined hands.

"Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!"

A radiant light flashed from the quartet, causing the rhinoceros to break into pieces, dissipating all the way down to the glass orb that is Daizo's soul. The fairies made the bubble disappear, allowing Kyoya to wheel around the grassy area. He picked up Daizo's soul and very carefully placed it back into his Soul Portal. The Soul Portal disappeared and the color returned to his face.

"Thank goodness we saved him in time," Cure Starlight said.

"Come on! I wish we could have just left him. He's not worth it!" Cure Dusk proclaimed. Cure Dawn donned a disappointed look and elbowed her. "Ow! Hey!"

"Wow. Zenjin's right. You frilly little girls sure are strong," Beileag said with large, sparkling eyes, like she witnessed a wonderful magic show. But the girls kept their guard up, since she literally just mentioned she's acquainted with Zenjin. The fairies and Kyoya as well.

"What do you, Zenjin, and Decebal intend to do with the Energia?! Take over the world?! Blow everybody up?! Erase our world and possibly others from existence?!" Cure Starlight asked vehemently with her naginata pointed at Beileag, even though they're far away from each other. Cure Dusk readied her bow and arrow and Cure Dawn readied her shiny nunchucks.

"Taking over the world is, like, so cliche. If Zenjin wanted to do that, he'd have done it by now," Beileag told them while shrugging, like she was having a casual conversation with some new acquaintances. "Besides, I'm not the one carrying out their plans. I just happen to be the adoptive mother of the one holding the Energia, and he's the one who uses it, not me. All I care about is buying pretty dresses because he keeps blowing up my stash!"

The girls sweatdropped. "Huh?"

"This is our evil villain's sidekick? Did she come out of a Disney movie or something? Is she supposed to be the bumbling type?" Cure Dawn asked.

"Who blows up dresses?" Cure Twilight asked.

"Honestly, I really don't care about what happens around here-" Beileag was about to say until someone cut her off.

"Beileag!"

"Decebal! Do NOT call me Beileag!" Beileag turned around to find Decebal behind her with a very disappointed look on her face, like a father who witnessed his kid do something bad, like buy overly sexual magazines.

"Your job is to gather information, and here you are dilly-dallying and gallivanting off in some waterlife museum!" Decebal scolded.

"Awww, come on! I really was trying to find some 411, but you know how hard it is with practically NO specifics on what to look for! Besides, I managed to find the Pretty Cure you've been telling me so much about," Beileag whined like a petulant little child.

"I don't have the patience for dealing with them right now. Come back home at once, Beileag. Zenjin's throwing a tantrum as usual and I can't control him," Decebal grabbed her arm and dragged her away from the scene.

"Hey! Wait! I wanna buy some new dresseeeees!" Beileag whined before Decebal made them disappear into thin air. Other than Daizo's baby sister's persistent and incessant crying, the meadow was oddly silent until Cure Dusk broke it.

"I can't take that hippie girl seriously," Cure Dusk mused.

"Me either," Cure Twilight said. "She acts like a ditz."

* * *

The girls returned to the now destroyed aquarium and turned back to normal. Their parents found them and tearfully embraced them, relieved to see their children are alright. "Marina! Oh, thank God you're alright!" Hatoko cried as she squeezed Marina so tight she didn't want to let her go.

"Where did you go?! We were so worried about you! The whole place flooded!" Kyouichi asked.

"Sorry. We tried to follow you, but the flood waters got too high, so we had to find an alternate escape route. I made sure everyone was okay," Hotaru explained to both her own parents and everyone else's.

"How come your wheelchair isn't sopping wet?" Kayoko asked tearfully after her worries got strongly swept away by a tsunami of relief, feeling complete again.

"We were on high ground," Kyoya replied sheepishly. Even he knew it was a terrible lie. But Kayoko and Jiroemon seemed to believe it, happy that his wheelchair isn't wet. If it was, it'd be broken and they'd have to pay thousands of dollars for a new one. However, at this time, they embraced Kyoya and held him tight like Hatoko, relieved that he's okay.

Not only that, Daizo and his baby sister reunited with their family as well. Riko smiled when she noticed something. Daizo was holding Kasane in his hands, smiling warmly as the happy baby nuzzled his cheek. "Kasane...I'm so happy you're safe…" Riko would never forget the kind words. Daizo would probably find them embarrassing, but at this point, he didn't care. Not only that, a tearful Tamiko trapped both Daizo and Kasane in her arms, saying the exact same thing, but a bit more hysterically.

Later on, the girls sans Riko went back to their parents and left. Kyoya and Riko, tired from the ordeal, found themselves sleeping in the car throughout the ride. "Jiro. Look," Kayoko whispered. Jiroemon turned around to find Kyoya and Riko sleeping in the back seat, with Riko's head on Kyoya's shoulder. Holding hands. Moonbeam and Lovebeam slept on Kyoya's lap. The two parents smiled sweetly, charmed by the sight.

"They're so cute. I'm glad they're safe," Kayoko told him, with some tears still struggling to creep out of the corners of her eyes.

"Yes. Me too," Jiroemon said as they found themselves within the vicinity of Riko's house.

Author's Note: Phew! It took me a while, but I FINALLY revised this entire chapter from scratch! I changed the source of Daizo's frustrations, added some extra scenes and details, and toned down some things to make it less Writer On Board-y. I'm pretty proud of how this came out, but let me know if there are any problems that still need to be addressed, and I'll hop on them when I have time. I hope you enjoy it!


	16. The Magic of Rozanielan Stories!

**Author's Note: Hello everyone. Julia here. Sorry I haven't been updating much lately. School and harsh midterms have been on my tail, and I need to keep my priorities straight. But that doesn't mean I haven't been planning and revising! I already came up with new ideas for TwiPre's second half. I just need to get the mojo together to actually write the things out without making them look incredibly choppy. Or maybe I should just write new chapters from scratch. But that website called Springhole is helping me a lot! Thanks to GeckoGecko554 for showing it to me! Why didn't I see this website sooner?!**

**Anyway, here's a brand spanking new version of episode 16!**

Episode 16: The Magic of Rozanielan Stories on a Rainy Night!

Rain drops pounded on the poor, hapless town of Hikaribashi like a waterfall that stretched on for miles. Only the tears of a thousand weeping angels could cause such a deluge. The rain was so thick and so strong that the sound of it pounding on glass windows and rooftops could be heard from the deepest of basements. This was the kind of deluge that laughed at umbrellas and gawked at rain coats.

One young girl of thirteen dashed through the sopping wet streets, holding a sopping wet newspaper over her head to keep it off, even though it did nothing to help. The black ink mixed with the grey paper, its contents nigh unreadable. The girl herself was soaked to the bone, with her ragged clothes and dirty sneakers heavy from too much absorbed water. Her black hair stuck to her face like glue. She ran around, looking all around to see if she could take shelter somewhere. She couldn't stay out in this deluge much longer.

She found herself near the Sparkle Diner, which had a green and white awning covering the entrance and the back deck. With a smile, she ran underneath the awning, threw away the wet newspaper, and sat on a bench in front of the entrance. Her skin stung with frigid cold. Her clothes clung to her skin like glue. As happy as she was to be out of the rain, it was going to be a while before this deluge would cease.

"What'll I do? Sorane's gonna get worried," The girl mused to herself worriedly. She could already picture her older sister wondering where she is, going out to look for her. The girl wished she had a way to contact her and let her know she's alright.

The problem? She doesn't have a phone. She didn't know the shelter's phone number. She couldn't just go inside and ask to use a phone. What if the people who work in there turn her away? That had happened too many times before. But she figured she could just sit and wait for the rain to stop. The question was, when would that be?

"Huh? Umi-chan?"

Umi turned around to find a red haired girl with squared shaped glasses standing before her, holding a blue umbrella. "Yui-chan? What are you doing here?"

Yui smiled. "Hah! I knew it was you! I pass by here on my way home from school! But wow, you're soaked to the bone."

Umi looked down at her clothes sheepishly. "Yeah...I am…"

"Hey! Here's an idea! Wanna stay at my house for a while?"

"Huh? Are you sure?"

Yui took Umi by the hand. She couldn't believe how cold Umi's hand was, but she didn't feel the need to voice it. "Come on! It'll be perfect! I've always wanted to invite you over to my house! Besides, it'll be way better than sitting around in the rain!"

Yui's house. Pictures began forming in Umi's mind. A nice house. Clean, fresh clothes. A warm dinner. Home cooked meals. She could already smell things like fresh bread, roasted chicken, and steaming vegetables. Without thinking, she blurted out, "Okay!"

"Yay!" Yui jumped up and down. "Come on! My house is a little ways from here!"

With that, Yui took Umi by the hand and escorted her to her house. Yui was right, her house was very close by, so even though they got a little soaked, it didn't take them long to get there. "Mom! I'm back!"

"Hi, Yui! How was-" A mousy young woman came to the door but stopped when she saw Umi. "Oh my!"

"Mom! This is my friend Umi-chan! Umi-chan, this is my mom, Nanami!" Yui introduced her friend to her mother.

"It's nice to meet you, Umi-chan," Nanami said.

Umi blushed a bit. "Uh...sorry to bother you. Yui-chan brought me here."

"Mom! Can Umi-chan stay with us until the rain stops? Please?" Yui begged.

"I don't see why not, and I'm sure I can find some clothes for you. You're soaking wet! Goodness! I'll be making dinner soon, so maybe that'll warm you up a bit," Nanami scurried off to find some fresh clothes for Umi.

Umi couldn't believe this was happening. She stood at the entrance, wet and confused, unable to comprehend everything. At first, she thought she was dreaming. She poked herself on the hand, which proved that this was real. "Hey, Umi-chan! Wanna try some clothes on with me?"

"The bathroom's ready if you want to use it, Umi-chan!" Nanami called out.

"Uh...thanks! I'm sorry for the trouble!" Umi exclaimed sheepishly, feeling guilty for popping in on them like this. But she liked how warm the house was. She already felt like she was at home.

* * *

"Whoa. That rain is hardcore," Marina peered out of Hotaru's bedroom window, flabbergasted by how hard this rain was falling.

Hotaru sat on her bed reading yet another detective novel. Sunbeam and Riko were having a Pokemon battle on their Nintendo DSes. Well, Sunbeam was borrowing Anzu's DS. Moonbeam and Starbeam sat on Hotaru's bed, reading some Hinata Sun Child volumes that Riko brought with her. Anzu sat at Hotaru's desk, browsing through the internet to see if she could find anything interesting to show them. Lovebeam sat in a corner, with her arms crossed and sticking her lips out like a petulant child. Kyoya just laid on the floor, watching Sunbeam lose the battle.

"Awwww! You beat me again!" Sunbeam complained.

"Sorry," Riko stammered sheepishly.

"Man, these human games are hard! But I do have a better grasp of this battle system so I'll beat you next time!" Sunbeam exclaimed. "In fact, I demand another rematch!"

"Sunbeam. You've battled Riko five times," Anzu chimed in. "Both DS lights are red. You better charge them up."

Riko already pulled out her charger. The insides of her eyes were throbbing. "Good point. My eyes feel like they're gonna fall out."

Hotaru's book slumped on her stomach. "Uuuugh...that was disappointing. I'm giving this back to the library."

"Don't you like detective novels?" Kyoya asked.

Hotaru exclaimed. "I rented this last week. I thought I'd like it...but it bored me to tears! And that twist was so predictable I could see it coming from a mile away."

"This is boring!" Lovebeam shouted. "This rain completely ruined our day!"

Riko covered her ears. "We know that. I sure am glad I brought my games, DVDs, and books with me. Wanna watch some anime?"

"We already watched some of your DVDs, Riko," Marina piped in.

"Nobody's interested in Moomins!" Lovebeam chirped.

"Can it, you loudmouth!" Kyoya snapped.

"What?! It's true!"

"Shh! If you yell, Sojiro-san and Kyouichi-san will discover our true identities," Starbeam shushed.

"Boo! I don't wanna sit around here all the time! I should be outside where people can admire my beauty!" Lovebeam complained.

"Well, we don't wanna sit here listening to you whine," Marina twirled an orange ringlet around her finger.

"Hey!"

Riko criss-crossed her legs a bit. She found herself smiling warmly as she plugged her charger to one of Hotaru's outlets. The Nintendo DS light glowed orange. Truth be told, Riko loved being here with her friends. She had never gotten to do this before when she lived in Yokosuka. It was like a dream come true.

All of a sudden, Sojiro came into the room. "Girls? There's some cake downstairs if you want some."

Riko sprang up from the floor, her face radiant. "Oh! Can we have some? Please?"

"Sure."

"Thanks! Yay!" Riko stormed out of the room to get some cake.

"Ugh! This rain completely ruined our day!" Marina complained.

"I know how you feel," Sojiro said. "But you know, when I was young, whenever my friends and I would get stuck in the house during storms, we would sit around telling stories. Some we made up or just go on about stuff that happened in our lives."

"That's...actually not a bad idea," Kyoya agreed.

Hotaru raised her hand. "Hey, Dad! Wanna tell everyone about that time you broke it down on the dance floor at junior prom?"

Sojiro sweatdropped. "I'll...see what I can do. I was voted Most Likely to Break It Down on The Dance Floor in my high school yearbook superlatives. Also Most Musically Talented. I wonder if I still have my yearbook somewhere? I'll go find it," Sojiro left to find his old yearbook.

Riko came into the room with many forks and four slices of cake on one plate. "I brought some cake for you, fairies!"

"Wow! Thanks!" Moonbeam was the first to dive in and grab a bite.

"I'm not in the mood for cake," Anzu said as Sunbeam and Lovebeam fought over a slice of cake.

"Why's your piece bigger than mine?!"

"It just is! Are you gonna have some or not?"

"I want the bigger piece!"

"There's plenty to go around!"

"Girls. Please don't quarrel, especially with such vociferous voices," Starbeam said. "You two haven't changed one bit."

"Do they always fight over silly stuff like this?" Hotaru asked.

"Yes. Back at home, there was never a day when Sunbeam and Lovebeam didn't quarrel over petty, trivial things. It was very tedious," Starbeam explained.

"Hey! Here's an idea! How about we tell you our favorite Rozanielan stories?" Moonbeam exclaimed cheerfully.

Silence.

"Is...that bad?"

"No. Anything to kill the boredom," Marina piped in.

Riko's eyes lit up with curiosity. "So what kinds of stories do you read on Rozaniela?"

"Oh! I'd love to tell you one of my favorite stories! It's called The Girl and The Wolf!" Moonbeam began.

(story)

_You see, in a place called the Luminous Land, fairies, people, and beasts of all kinds lived peacefully for many years. But one day, a wolf by the name of Wolfram came out of his forest into town. He and his pack attacked many people and the humans and sorcerers tried to hold them off. Some other wolves managed to stop them before anything got bad, and tried to convince the humans that they had no idea Wolfram would do such a thing, but the humans wouldn't listen and ostracized them for many years. The wolves stayed in their part of the forest, and the humans began teaching their kids to fear wolves, telling them that wolves are nothing but bad creatures who eat and kill people._

_But one family lived near the wolves' terrain, the Darlians. Their youngest daughter, Rosa, wandered into the forest by accident when she was six, and some friendly wolves helped escort her home. Like the townspeople, Rosa used to think wolves were scary, but after they helped her, she saw that they weren't scary like everyone else thought. Rosa was a sweet girl who loved all creatures. Ever since that day, she often offered to go shopping for her ailing grandmother and cross the forest to deliver food to her. Her parents were very opposed to it at first._

"_We can't let you go into that part of the forest!" Rosa's father shouted._

"_Why not? I've been in there before," Rosa replied._

"_The wolves! They're ferocious creatures!" Rosa's mother exclaimed._

"_They're not ferocious. If they were, they'd have eaten me when I got lost. I don't think they're bad. Please, mother? Can I cross the forest to deliver food to grandmother? It's much easier than going all away around," Rosa begged._

_They finally relented soon after, and Rosa began going through the forest many times to both give food to her grandmother and see the wolves. As Rosa suspected, many wolves she encountered were very nice. When she was about seven, she befriended one young wolf named Faolan. He was a very sweet little thing, and they played together every day. In this story, animals and humans can talk to each other. There's a lot more details, but you'll have to read the books to go into that stuff. Anyway, one day, when Rosa turned fourteen, she and Faolan sat down to talk._

"_Faolan? Why do humans and wolves hate each other?" Rosa asked._

"_My mother told me that a wolf named Wolfram and his pack attacked some people long ago. She said he felt they robbed his tribe of their rightful territory. Some other wolves managed to stop him before he could do anything else, but humans and wolves hardly ever made contact before then, and the humans were convinced that all wolves were bad. Some of my mother's friends were killed because people hunted them for their fur," Faolan explained._

"_That's awful!" Rosa exclaimed, aghast with horror._

"_Yeah," Faolan looked down at the flowers sadly. "I wandered out of the forest once, and some humans tried to kill me. My parents told me to never leave the forest because humans think we're bad. But...we're not bad," Faolan looked up at Rosa with sad eyes and said, "Why would people think an entire species is bad all because of one wolf?"_

_Rosa didn't have an answer for that. But she knew one thing for sure. "Well, I don't think wolves are bad. If they were, they wouldn't have helped me when I needed them. I think they're nice. You're very nice, and you're my best friend forever, Faolan. Don't ever forget that," Rosa told him._

_Faolan was moved by her kindness and sincerity. In fact, after that, Rosa had an idea. "I know! How about I introduce you to my family and friends? I can convince them that wolves aren't bad if they see how nice you are!"_

"_That's a great idea! My parents like you, so maybe your parents will like me!" Faolan agreed._

_With that, Rosa brought Faolan to her house and showed him to her parents. At first, they were scared, thinking that Faolan was going to eat them. "No! Don't hurt him! He's my friend! He's nice!" Rosa cried, begging her parents to not kill him._

_After some opposition, they relented, and allowed Faolan to stay in their house for the day. Faolan acted as he usually did: friendly, caring, honest, and calm. Much to Rosa's delight, her plan worked! Her parents found Faolan to be a very nice wolf. In fact, when Faolan left to go home, Rosa's mother approached her and said, "For all these years everyone around me said that wolves were ferocious creatures. It's kind of a shock to see that that turned out to be a big lie. Rosa...thank you for introducing us to Faolan. You can invite him over any time you like."_

_Rosa couldn't help but cheer and jump up and down with delight. "Yaaay! Thank you, Mom! You're the best!" She hugged her mother and went to bed._

_Later, she introduced Faolan to her friends at school. Some of them were scared, but others approached Faolan right off. Some of them stopped being scared while others wouldn't even go near him. Soon, many townspeople got to meet Faolan and realize that not all wolves are bad. In fact, Rosa even invited her friends to Faolan's house, and Faolan's family was very nice to them. Their friends were so impressed that they didn't fear wolves anymore. Rosa and Faolan were happy that they got to show everyone what wolves were really like. All it took was a little calm and understanding._

_However, one of Rosa's teachers told a hunter about Faolan. A man named Tiberius heard about the wolves and their interactions with humans and decided to hunt them down, thinking they were plotting to attack, just like a few years ago. Thankfully, one of Rosa's friends, Paige, told Rosa and Faolan about it, and they devised a plan to warn the wolves about him and stop him from causing trouble._

_They managed to get to the forest before Tiberius could and told the wolves everything. The wolves and some of Rosa's friends worked together to stop Tiberius from killing any wolves, even though it was hard at first. But Tiberius falls down a waterfall and almost dies. Thankfully, Faolan and his friends managed to save him and take him to the hospital for treatment. This kind act manages to convince not just Tiberius, but many people that wolves aren't ferocious after all._

_After re-evaluating their values and how wrong they were, the humans, fairies, wolves, and other creatures finally made peace, learning that just because some individuals are bad, that doesn't make an entire species bad._

(end story)

"The end!" Moonbeam finished.

Riko found herself teary eyed. "Awww! That's such a sweet story! Can I read the actual book if you ever bring it here?"

"Of course! But it's in Rozanielan, so someone may have to translate it," Moonbeam clarified. "I used to have the book, but it got destroyed when our house got attacked," Moonbeam's ears drooped downward sadly.

Riko smiled and stroke Moonbeam's ears gently. "It'll be okay."

"The Girl and the Wolf is actually one of Rozaniela's most successful novels, published by an alien by the name of Lucasta Felice Maor. It sold about one billion copies in the first two weeks of publication, and is required reading in all Rozanielan schools," Starbeam explained.

"I wouldn't mind reading it," Hotaru piped in.

"Me too!" Anzu chirped.

"Me three," Kyoya added.

"Hmph! I think it's overrated," Lovebeam complained.

"No one asked you," Marina retorted.

"My turn!" Sunbeam chimed in, raising her stubby hand. "This one's my favorite! It's called The Mystery of the Sunrise Kingdom!"

(story)

_In Sunland, there's two kingdoms. The Sunrise Kingdom and the Sunset Kingdom. The Sunrise Kingdom's queen, Queen Celestina, has the power to raise the sun. The Sunset Kingdom's queen, Queen Celia, has the power to raise the moon. Both kingdoms lived in peace for a while. But something happened to Queen Celestina that nobody knows about, and she isn't the same kind, gentle, motherly queen that everyone remembers._

_Not only that, a dragon kidnapped Celestina's daughter, Princess Handan, and took her to the Lonely Mountains. Celia sends her daughter, Princess Judith, an aspiring knight, to get Princess Handan back. Judith fights many monsters, deals with bandits, saves some poor people from getting killed, and manages to help some friendly spirits find their way home. She has to find her own food and make her own way through many forests and rivers. But finally, she makes it to the Lonely Mountains._

_She manages to find Princess Handan...but she isn't being held hostage. Rather, she became friends with the dragon!_

"_Princess Handan! I'm here to save you from that dragon!" She shouted, drawing her sword._

_Princess Handan was a pretty flighty little girl of about twelve years old. She and that dragon were acting like best buddies. "No you're not!" Handan shouted. "Don't kill my sweet Draggy! He's my friend! He saved me!"_

"_Saved you?" Princess Judith found it very hard to believe. "How so? My mother sent me to rescue you!"_

_Princess Handan crossed her arms and boldly told her, "I told Draggy to take me away from the Sunrise Kingdom! It's a mess over there! In fact, it's no longer my home!"_

_Princess Judith found herself very angry. "Handan! It's your home! How can you just abandon it like that?! Do you realize how selfish you sound?!"_

"_Believe me, I tried to save my kingdom, but nothing I did worked! My mother's possessed by some dark magic and no matter what I tried, the spell didn't break! My mother's not the same person she used to be, and whenever I tell everyone about it, they all act like I'm some compulsive liar! Not even my servants realize what's wrong!" Handan explained. "Draggy's the only one who understands what's going on and I asked him to take me away. I couldn't stand being there for a moment longer!"_

_Judith was pretty frustrated by this turn of events, but she did realize that Handan's claims did have some teeth to them. There had been rumors going around in her kingdom that Queen Celestina underwent a major personality change one day, and no one knows why. Judith decided she could investigate this matter. So with that, she took Handan and Draggy with her to the Sunrise Kingdom to see if they could investigate the matter._

_There's a lot of stuff they go through, but there's too much detail so I'll just give you the gist of it. After they did some digging, they met a kind villager named Ymir who is one of few people who knows of Princess Celestina's personality change. She said that she saw Princess Celestina talking to someone, but nobody was actually there. She suspected she wasn't in her right mind and became worried, because ever since Princess Celestina changed, villagers went missing._

_With Ymir on their side, Judith, Handan, and Draggy finally confronted Princess Celestina. As it turned out, a traveling merchant sold Celestina a rare magical stone that was said to contain an evil spirit who was sealed away long ago. Celestina knew touching the stone was dangerous and refused to buy it, but the merchant purposefully put her hand on it and allowed the spirit to completely take control of Celestina's body._

_Joining forces, everyone fought against the corrupted Queen Celestina and Handan and Judith managed to create a spell strong enough to force the spirit out of Celestina's body. The spirit-Mola-as it turns out, wanted nothing more than to feel important for once in his lonely life. Despite everything he did, Handan and Judith managed to make him feel important, which was what he needed to finally ascend to heaven. He was even kind enough to give back the missing villagers. As it turned out, he swallowed them because they saw through his spell and didn't want them to report his corruption of Queen Celestina. Ymir was the only one who managed to escape thanks to being an experienced archer and horse rider._

_After that, Celestina and Handan were finally reunited. Celestina was so impressed with Judith's kindness and Handan's bravery that she gave them special rewards. Draggy would be Handan's personal steed, and Handan would be allowed to fulfill her dream of becoming a dragonologist. A dragonologist is someone who studies dragons. Not only that, Judith was granted a position in Queen Celestina's royal guard, who would be on duty to protect the kingdom whenever possible. Queen Celia was very happy for her daughter, knowing that she always dreamed of becoming a night._

_Ymir was given a special reward, too. Thanks in part to her action, Ymir was given a special scholarship to the Sunrise Archer's Academy, where she could learn to be a warrior. She also got given a nicer house and lots of money so her family can finally live in stability. After that, everything was peachy keen!_

(end story)

"You'll have to lend me that book sometime," Kyoya said.

Sunbeam stroke one of her roly poly ears and chuckled a bit. "I will if they get new copies...and translate them for you."

"That sounds really interesting!" Riko exclaimed, her eyes lighting up with curiosity.

"The Mystery of the Sunrise Kingdom is also a perpetually popular book, but not nearly as popular as The Girl and The Wolf. It was written by a human named Beowulf Wess Applefield," Starbeam explained.

"Beowulf sounds like an awesome name," Kyoya added.

"That one's also overrated!" Lovebeam piped in petulantly, but nobody paid her any heed. "Can I tell you all the story of the Super Duper Love Love Lovely Lovebeam?" She chimed in sweetly. Again, nobody paid any attention. Realizing that they weren't listening, she crossed her arms and petulantly sat down, sticking her lips out like a duck.

"So...what other stories do you have?" Hotaru asked. "They all sound really interesting."

"Umm…" Starbeam raised her hand shyly. "May I ask permission for taking the liberty to tell one of my favorite pieces of modern literature?"

"Sure! Hit us where it hurts, Starry!" Anzu chimed in cheerfully.

Starbeam smiled and put her two hands on her chest. "This one's very dear to my heart. It is promptly titled The Forgiven Writer."

(story)

_It's a lovely story, I opine. The main character is a man named Jingi. He is not a very nice person. Rather, he likes to go around trolling people and pushing their berserk buttons. On one particularly roasty summer day, he trolled a picture someone drew, not realizing the story behind it. The picture showed a young woman mourning a smiling dead child who had cancer. The child, who was the woman's relative, died, and said child had received a mountain of continuous support, both moral and financial, from everyone who was acquainted with them, family and friends alike._

_When he trolled that image, everyone was so appalled by what Jingi had done that they bombarded him with insults and yelling en masse. They claimed that he was a selfish, immature, heartless person who doesn't care about anyone but himself, completely indifferent to those hr hurt, that everyone tried to tell him what he did was wrong but that he didn't listen, that he should act his age, that he's victim blaming, among other things._

_He could have proved them right, since being callous, malicious, spiteful, and virulent was practically his modus operandi and raison d'etre. But he didn't. Instead, after realizing what he had done was so far beyond trolling that even he was disgusted with himself, he gave a heartfelt apology to everyone, admitting that what he had done had crossed so many lines that he knew he would never be forgiven for it. They forgave him for his willingness to admit to his mistake._

"_I appreciate your kindness, but don't bother. I can apologize all I want, but I didn't just hurt someone with my words and actions," Jingi said. "I mocked a dead child who had cancer! If anything, I deserve no forgiveness! Not for everything I've done!"_

"_Well, we forgive you anyway. You were willing to admit to your mistake and make up for it. That takes courage, my friend," One citizen said._

"_Yes. We're sorry we put words in your mouth in the process. We should have handled the situation better ourselves."_

"_We're all friends. We forgive. Apology accepted. Next time, just check to make sure it's something that deserves to be trolled."_

_Jingi was moved to tears. He didn't think he deserved any forgiveness, but the fact that they forgave him while realizing their own faults in the situation made him feel as though he could go to heaven. He spent the rest of the day giving support to those who expressed sorrow regarding the image. __With this apology, the citizens granted him the highest title they could offer: honorary friend. Jingi humbly declined their kindness, but expressed gratitude for it regardless. After that, he went on a journey to bestow hate elsewhere._

(end story)

"Awwww! That's an even sweeter story!" Riko crooned.

Marina gagged. "Ugh! And sappy!"

Hotaru brushed some hair out of her face. "I think it's wonderful. It shows that even the most callous of people can redeem themselves and earn forgiveness if they're willing to own up to their mistakes," She added.

"I know which one's my favorite," Anzu agreed.

Kyoya turned to Lovebeam. "Do you have a story you wanna tell?"

Lovebeam averted his gaze. "No. I'm not very fond of reading or stories. Fashion is my compassion."

"Don't you mean passion?" Riko asked.

Riko didn't see anything wrong with correcting Lovebeam's grammar, and Lovebeam herself didn't seem bothered by it. However, Marina glared at Riko like she committed a crime and shouted, rather harshly, "Don't you know it's rude to correct someone's grammar in public?! Everyone messes up! Even you! Don't be such a snob!"

Marina's voice was so loud that Riko's ears started hurting. As soon as Riko covered them with her ears, her eyes started to blur and become wet. "I wasn't trying to be rude!" Riko cried tearfully.

"Well, you are!"

"Stop it, Marina," Hotaru shot off her bed and put a hand on Marina's shoulder, stopping the orange haired girl from frightening Riko further. But Riko, confused and tearful, stormed out of Hotaru's bedroom.

"Riko!" Anzu chased after her, with Moonbeam flying right into her hood.

Kyoya gave Marina a disappointed look. "Okay. That was SO not necessary."

Hotaru did the same. She kept herself calm yet austere. "You shouldn't have yelled like that."

"But she should know it's rude to correct someone's grammar in public! She should know better!" Marina protested.

"I didn't know you were a member of the grammar police," Kyoya added.

"She didn't mean any harm. It's okay. It wasn't like she was making fun of me or anything," Lovebeam interjected.

"She's autistic, Marina. There are things she can't just know or figure out unless someone tells her. Lots of people are like that," Hotaru kept her voice clear and low. She needed to keep calm. Any more yelling would just make the situation worse. "Think of it this way. If you made an honest goof up and someone yelled at you about it and you didn't know why, wouldn't you be confused and upset?"

Marina looked down at her feet. She made good points. Marina remembered a time when she was ten, a classmate fell off his bike and came to school with bruises and casts. Every one of his friends surrounded him and asked about his experiences and said that his face was totally fine. Marina told him that his face was purple and puffy and gross, and as soon as she said that, all of her classmates yelled at her about how she shouldn't say stuff like that to people and that she should know better. Marina shot back that she was just being honest, and another kid said that she's a criminal, which made Marina and that kid get into a fight. Both got detention.

Just like back then, Marina let her anger get the better of her. Marina facepalmed. She wished she didn't have such a short fuse, or better yet, that she never called Riko a snob. "I can't believe I said that! Why am I so dumb?!"

Down in the living room, Riko hid behind a couch in tears. She just sat behind it, her legs in a pretzel shape, staring down at the rug, letting her tears fall and make dark marks on it. Anzu hopped on the couch and looked down at the girl from above. "Riko?"

Moonbeam flew out of Anzu's hood and fluttered down into Riko's arms. As she descended, the purple bunny fairy stroke Riko's arm with a smile, hoping it'd cheer her up a bit. "Don't be sad."

"I'm sorry…"

"It's okay. You didn't know. Mari-chan shouldn't have yelled like that," Anzu told her gingerly, with a warm, kind look in her lime green eyes. The last thing Riko needed was more yelling.

"Nobody told me correcting someone was rude. Why do people expect me to just know stuff? They always get mad when I don't know stuff and I hate it," Riko whimpered.

"Now you know. But yeah, in public it's considered rude, but in private it's okay. I know you were just trying to help, and you're not a snob. If you were a snob, you'd be acting like you're better than everyone else, like Yoshie," Anzu told her.

"It's true!" Moonbeam agreed.

Riko smiled a bit. "Yeah."

"What are you doing over there?" Sojiro came into the room, seeing Riko behind the couch.

"Oh! Sorry! Mari-chan got mad and I just-!" Riko thought he was going to get mad and was about to scramble out from behind the couch.

But Sojiro simply smiled. "It's okay. I'm not mad."

"You're not?"

"She just wanted to go somewhere quiet. She corrected Mari's grammar and Mari got mad," Anzu explained matter-of-factly.

Sojiro sat down on the couch next to Anzu. "I see."

Riko told him the same thing she told Anzu. Sojiro took it all in without question. "I get what you mean. You know, when I was young, I didn't like school. I didn't like sitting at desks reading, and I especially didn't like homework. But my mother was rather strict about my education and always yelled at me whenever I got answers wrong. She'd say things like, _'You're nine years old! You should be able to write a coherent sentence by now!'_ and she'd go on and on and that always made me mad. In a way, I always felt small and inferior around my mother, and it always made me sad," Sojiro explained.

Anzu pulled a hair out of her face. "Now you know how I feel."

"That's not very nice of her," Riko piped in. "Shouldn't mothers be nice to their kids and help them out?"

"My mother...let's just say, isn't a very understanding person. I even told her straight up that I hated school, but she said, _'Well, you better like it! You'll never have a stable future if you don't get your act together!'_ Luckily, my father was far more understanding and always helped me when I needed him. I went to college for a while, but I dropped out. I just couldn't handle it," Sojiro elaborated further.

"Hotaru says you play the saxophone," Anzu piped in.

Sojiro's eyes lit up. "Oh, yes!" He clasped his hands together. "I loved playing the saxophone. I used to listen to a lot of Kaoru Abe(1)'s albums when I was younger, and I started playing the sax in high school. My classmates loved it, and my friends and I often got to put on shows at our school festival."

Riko slowly crawled out from behind the couch. "That must have been nice."

"Those were great times. I still haven't found that yearbook, though," Sojiro said.

Kyouichi came into the room. "So-kun. I found your yearbook," He held up a dark blue book with some grey lines going across it.

Sojiro's eyes lit up again. "Where'd you find it?"

"Under our bed."

"Thanks for telling us all this," Riko said.

"Not a problem."

With that, Riko, Moonbeam, and Anzu left the living room. Marina approached Riko with a remorseful look. "Riko. Sorry for snapping at you. Again."

"It's okay."

Lovebeam looked out the window. "Hey! The rain stopped!"

"Shh! They'll hear you!" Marina hissed.

Lovebeam's hands flew to her mouth in embarrassment.

* * *

Umi hadn't felt clean in a long time. She could still smell the cherry blossom scented shampoo she just used, and her skin felt soft and tender, smelling like soap. Instead of her old, drab, wet clothes, Yui gave her some clothes she didn't wear anymore: a long sleeved grey shirt, a long light blue skirt, and some yellow and grey socks. Umi wasn't sure how to feel about receiving Yui's clothes. On one hand, she was happy she got to wear something nice in a long while. But on the other hand, she felt guilty that Yui had to do this at all. These were Yui's clothes, and she didn't want to end up sullying them, even if Yui did give them to her of her own volition. She was grateful, however.

Not only that, Umi found that she enjoyed being in Yui's house. It was much nicer than the shelter. Everything was nice, clean, and homely. The kitchen was warm, always smelling like fresh strawberry pie. Umi's nose caught some scents of spices such as cinnamon. Umi and Yui played dress up in Yui's room, dressing up in trendy clothes, trying on flashy jewelry, pretending to be fashion models, listening to trendy pop girl music, all that stuff. Umi hadn't felt this happy in a long time. All of this seemed so far away to her, but now she felt as though she were home again.

When dinner came around, Umi was awestruck by what Nanami prepared: fresh steak, lettuce, rice pilaf, warm croquettes, and miso soup, complete with tofu. Umi never did like tofu, but she always loved it with miso soup. In fact, when Umi was young, she tried some tofu dipped in miso soup once and she loved it, prompting her parents to always serve miso soup with tofu in it just so they could make her eat something healthy. Umi wasted no time chowing down. For a moment, she forgot her table manners and wound up putting her elbows on the table and chewing with her mouth open. But nobody seemed to mind. Her joyful face said it all.

"Yui tells me you're a very good student," Nanami said.

Umi swallowed a bolus of rice before talking. "I'm not that good. I mostly get B's and C's. Nakano Retsu is the smartest kid in my grade. He gets all the A's. I'll never be as smart as he is."

"Oh, don't be so modest, Umi-chan! You got an A on that spelling test, thanks to moi!" Yui proudly bumped her chest with a fist.

Umi blushed a bit. "That's true," After that, she ate a piece of steak.

"So what do you do in your free time?" Nanami asked.

"Not much, really," Umi replied sheepishly. "I mostly do homework, read, or go for walks with my big sister when she's trying to find a job."

"What's your sister like?" Yui asked.

"She's mostly nice. But lately...she's always in a bad mood now," Umi's joyful expression faded. "She can't seem to find a job. I wish there was something I could do to make her happy. She's not the same person she used to be."

"Lots of people fall on hard times, sweetie," Nanami said, with her hands folded. "If you ever need help or just want to talk, we're more than happy to do whatever we can. Yui-chan tells me a lot about you."

Umi happened to notice a replica of a large fish hanging on a wall. Without finishing her dinner, she squealed and ran over to stare at it. "Wooow! You have a replica of a bluefin tuna!"

"You...like fish?" Nanami asked, confused.

"Yep yep yep! I LOVE fish!" Umi began happily. "In fact, I wanna be an aquarium owner when I grow up so I can live my whole life surrounded by fish, taking care of fish! I actually read some books on fish at the library at my elementary school! Did you know that bluefin tuna is a common name for a species of tuna called Thunnus? There's the Southern bluefin tuna, the Pacific bluefin tuna, which used to be called the Northern bluefin tuna, the Atlantic bluefin tuna, and the Longtail tuna. The Southern bluefin tuna weighs exactly 570 pounds at most and is about 8.2 feet long! Their species name is thunnus maccoyii, named by a French naturalist named Francis de Laporte de Castelnau in 1872. Southern bluefin tuna like to eat many types of fish, crabs, cephalopods, salps, and other marine animals, though I don't think fish should eat each other. I don't like eating fish because they taste all icky. Plus I think all fish should live in the ocean and not get eaten, even if it is part of the circle of life. Southern bluefin tuna are actually endangered animals because people kept on hunting them and wouldn't stop. I actually read about a bird called the Passenger Pigeon that got hunted to complete extinction. That was because people kept on eating them and selling their meat all over the country after catching lots and lots of them. The very last Passenger Pigeon was named Martha, and she died at about 1:00 on September 1st, 1914-"

Umi wanted to go on, but the phone rang, which gave a frazzled Nanami an excuse to leave the dinner table. "I'll get it!" It was at this point that Umi stopped talking.

"You sure...know a lot," Yui stammered.

Umi went back to the table and finished her dinner. She didn't want it to get cold. She did notice something: the sound of rain hitting the windows stopped. When she finished eating, she looked out the window. The rain stopped, leaving only huge puddles all around the neighborhood. She checked the clock on the wall. It read 6:34 PM.

"Thanks for the food. I should get going," Umi said as she put her shoes on.

"Awww! You should stay longer!" Yui begged.

"I'd like to, but my sister's probably worried about me. I have to be back at the shelter by eight," Umi said. She was about to mention her homework, but then she remembered that she and Yui worked on it together, so she figured it'd be redundant to mention it again. "But...thanks for inviting me, Yui-chan. I hadn't had fun like that in a long time."

"You should definitely come over again next time! When the weather's better, that is."

Umi nodded before waving goodbye and heading out the door.

After about fifteen minutes, Umi arrived at a tall brick building. A sign in front of the door read 'Sunshine Shelter.' She went inside and found herself surrounded by people. She pushed through the crowds and found a row of beds.

An older girl with long black hair tied in pigtails saw Umi come in, and gasped audibly. "UMI!" The older girl leaped onto Umi and squeezed her so tight she didn't want to let go. "Oh, thank God you're okay!"

"Hi, Sorane," Umi muttered, her voice muffled by the tight hug.

The worried older girl let go of Umi and gave her a worried but stern look. "Where in the world were you?! I was worried sick! I was just about to go out looking for you!"

Umi clasped her hands together apologetically. "Sorry, sis! I ran into Yui-chan at the Sparkle Diner and she invited me to her house."

"Why didn't you call the shelter?!"

"I wanted to, but I forgot the number!"

Sorane stopped and looked at Umi's new clothes. "Where did you get those?"

"These? Yui-chan gave them to me to keep. They let me stay for dinner and everything."

Sorane found herself smiling warmly, having calmed down a little. She rubbed Umi's hair gently. "Glad you're okay. Tell me about your day. Was it fun?"

Umi's radiant smile returned in full force. "Of course it was!"

Footnotes:

1\. Kaoru Abe was a famous saxophonist who is considered to have the greatest abrasive saxophone sound. He died at the very early age of 29. No one knows why or how.


	17. Starbeam Is Kidnapped!

Chapter 17: Starbeam is kidnapped! The Pretty Cure are in trouble!

Hatoko drove the Asagi family car on a street heading for a jail. Marina sat in the front seat, watching the scenery fly right by. The trees going by looked a lot like fast moving pastel paints on a blue, grey, and white canvas as they sped past it. Finally, they arrived at a small gate operated by a security guard. Hatoko rolled down her window.

"I'm here to see Wakita Shouji," Hatoko told the gruff-looking security guard.

"Does he know you're coming?" The officer asked.

"No."

The man pointed to another part of the big white building. "Go the back way. It has a special entrance for cases like these."

"Thank you," Hatoko said as she rolled up her window and drove to the back parking lot.

She parked her car in a lot which, as it turned out, wasn't very populated. Hatoko and Marina got out and walked to the back entrance. An officer greeted them politely and escorted them inside. The building was surprisingly clean, with sleek, shiny titanium walls, built in tables and chairs for the lunch room, everything was shiny, like they did some intense renovations on it. Marina could see some doors that had bars on them, and some prisoners' faces peeked out the windows to take a look at what was outside, unable to go out unless they were instructed to do so. Just being here made Marina's stomach churn and her body go jittery. Soon, they arrived in front of a door.

"We have officers guarding every entrance, even during visits like these so as to protect the guests from harm. They're always on call, so if anything happens, we'll be there to make sure the prisoner is detained at any cost," The officer explained. "I'll be here so he doesn't do anything skeevy. Alright?"

Hatoko nodded. Marina scratched her arm. The fact that her father was behind that door made her itchy in various places.

The door opened, revealing a small room with only a table and built in chairs. An old man with straight brown hair sat at the table, with his hands handcuffed. Marina stared right through him. The man's eyes had bags hanging from them, and he sat up straight, but Marina could tell his shoulders hunched a little. As Marina sat down, the man smiled sadly.

"It's so good to see you, Marina. You've grown," The man said in a choked voice.

Marina glared at him silently. _'Like you care,'_ She already wanted to leave. But the walls were thick and the room was small, trapping her and her mother inside. The police man guarding the door didn't help, even though Marina understood why he was there.

Her throat turned dry. The chair was too hard. The table was too cold, too shiny. Even though the room was dimly lit, it was too bright. She wanted it to be dark. Pitch black. So she wouldn't see his face. Hatoko and Shouji began talking. Their voices seemed so far away. Marina used her shoe to scratch an itch on her leg. God, how she wished to get the heck out of here. She doesn't even see their mouths moving, the pained expressions on both their faces. Their voices seemed completely inaudible.

Shouji looked uncomfortable, but he turned to Marina. She half-listens. "Mari. I'm sorry for everything I've done. I know I haven't been a great father."

His voice sounded so tired and small. Unimportant. Very much unlike the politician with the big ego that Marina would always see on TV, talking at press conferences and waving to the cameras, all smiles like the politician life was all sunshine and rainbows.

"I've ruined people's lives, including yours."

_'Oh, you don't know the HALF of it! Don't act like you know what I've been through!'_ She wanted to yell so bad. But she had to remember Ms. Watase's lessons. Be calm. Don't let the anger control you. Have self-control. But God, did she want to explode like a volcano! _'You never helped me with my homework-'_

"I've screwed up. I know."

_'-didn't show up for parents day, never spent time with me, never gave a rat's hat whenever I came home from a bad day at school, and always made excuses for pretty much everything! I have a conference, I have a meeting-'_

"I want to change."

_'-I had a last minute appointment I couldn't miss. I'll make it up to you, I promise. Yeah. Right. More of your empty promises. I'll make it up to you. I'll buy you lots of presents. I'll take you out to ice cream. I'll go to parent's day. I'll go to the school's cultural festival. I'll even let you have friends over-'_

"Shouji. She's not in the best of moods," said Hatoko, far away.

_'-Where were you when I broke my arm after I fell off my old bike?! Where were you when I failed three math tests in a row?! Where were you when I cried myself to sleep every time kids called me a criminal and compared me to you?! Where were you when Mom got slammed with insults from every person we walked by every time we went out even to get the mail?! Where were you when that woman you impoverished gave me this scar?! Where were-?!'_

"You don't have to forgive me. I don't deserve it after what I've done.'

_'Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. Liar. You don't know how people look at me, how they see me, the things they say about me behind my back, the things they say about me to my face, the things they wrote on every one of my desks, anything about how I've felt over these past few years-'_

For a moment, Marina thought she was drowning. Drowning in her own anger. She needed to get out. She needed to get out. She needed to breathe. Being in here felt like death.

"I'm sorry, Mari. I want to make it up to you."

Mari. Just the stoic way he says that nickname makes her cringe.

He apologized. It sounded empty.

She's so.

_Gosh darn._

**_Angry._**

She listened. Now it was time to stop listening.

Snap. Cut that thread like a knife. Let the volcano erupt. Don't keep it in.

"What a load of baloney!" Marina slammed her hands on the table. She stood up from that deathly hard chair. Hatoko recoiled a bit, holding her hands up like crab claws. Shouji didn't move at all. His eyes just widened, that was it.

Marina's face and eyes burned. They were stinging with heat. The trapped feeling didn't go away. Part of her just wanted to leap over this table, wring his neck, and watch him die. But no. She needed to get some grip on reality. She couldn't let the volcano erupt completely. It'd just come off as shallow. A childish temper tantrum. If there was one thing she needed to work on, it was her tendency to run her mouth.

But she was going to say what she wanted to say. Don't sugarcoat it.

Shouji seemed unfazed. "I know. Mari, I-"

"Stop. Just stop. Don't act like you know me. You don't. It's too late to be a father now. Better yet, you've never even been a father to me," Don't yell. Keep calm. Let the lava flow naturally. "You have no idea what Mom and I have been through because of your petty grudges and carelessness. Kids pick on me every day. They call me a criminal. They're convinced I'm gonna be just like you no matter what. Mom is always yelled at by random people on the street blaming her for what YOU did. A random lady gave me this scar because she thought I was you. I even turned into a bully and picked on people for my own amusement! How do you like that?! Huh?!"

Shouji said nothing. His expression became more and more grim. Marina continued on. "I can't even make normal conversation with people anymore. I have to take anger management classes. But you know what? I'd rather be there than in the same room with you any day. If you really wanted to make it up to me, you would have done so long ago. But face it! You don't care about anyone but yourself! You're not sorry at all! You don't even care that you hurt people and ruined their lives! Do you really believe that saying sorry is just going to magically make everything all sunshine and rainbows again? That it's just gonna magically fix everything?! Well, that's not how it works. If you really did care, you'd have used your power to make things better, and not make people's lives go down the drain because of stupid reasons."

"Marina..." Hatoko couldn't believe what she was seeing. Even Shouji found himself speechless.

"You were never a father to me. You never even cared about me. I don't care how many times you say sorry. It's not going to change anything, especially not the selfish, shallow idiot you are," Marina hissed. Shouji looked down sadly. That was when Marina stopped talking.

"Marina..." Shouji's voice told her he was on the verge of tears. Marina thought she was hearing things. It was hard enough just being here. Part of her wanted to hug him because she never saw him look like that before. But it could be a ploy. She didn't want to let herself get hurt yet again.

"I...I hate you. Shouji."

There. Hate. She said it. The word she had been gagging on since the whole mess started. Marina felt light as a feather. "I'm done. Let's bolt, Mom," Marina gestured to the guard to open the door, which he did. Marina left the room. She stayed out in the waiting room for the rest of the time.

Her eyes stung. Water came out. She found herself shaking. She plopped down on the cold table, buried her face in her arms, and bawled for about five minutes. She pulled her face out, her sleeves wet with tears, pulled out her CD player, put some headphones on and blasted some Blue Moon song. This one was her favorite. Heroes Face Their Fears.

She did compose herself enough to hear this stanza, sung by Kinou Asa. "Stand up to the delusion. Face your fear and you can be happy."

Then Marina remembered. Riko stood up to Marina, she herself being something someone feared. If Riko could do it, then...she just did it. She just sat with and told off her greatest fear to his face.

Hatoko came out of the room and noticed Marina's tears. "Marina. Are you okay?"

Marina smiled warmly. "I am now. I haven't felt this good in a long time. I'm glad you talked me into coming here. It really did do some good.

Hatoko smiled back. "That's good. We can finally put this to rest. Now how about we get some ice cream!"

Marina's golden eyes lit up, and her smile was radiant with childlike excitement. "Yeah! Can we go to Frozen Rock? I want their powerful pistachio pizazz!"

* * *

On the same day, Rina sat in her room, reading some books on her bed, right next to Miss Unicorn. But she's surprised to find that it isn't making her happy. She couldn't muster up the motivation to continue reading. It didn't give her satisfaction like it used to. Feeling bogged down, she closed her book and threw it on the floor. She tossed on her bed and hugged Miss Unicorn tightly, so tight she felt like she was never going to see her giant, beloved unicorn plushie ever again.

Kyoya's yelling from the other day kept replaying in her head like a tape recorder. She wished she could turn it off, but it refused to give her a break. Not even covering her ears like Riko would do helped any. She definitely remembered how helpless she felt, the humiliation, the feeling of having everything she knew be torn up in front of her, told that it's all wrong, that everyone lied to her, and that everything she had done hurt people's feelings.

She wanted to tell him he was wrong in everything he said to her. But she couldn't. She just couldn't deny it anymore. It was high time she faced reality once and for all, just like he wanted her to do: Kyoya was right about everything. The kids at school were right, too. It was like they read her entire being with just one look, one listen to her yelling at Riko over something silly, and called her out on everything. After getting brutally ripped apart that day, Rina actually did reflect on her actions, but not until after Saki finally sat her down and explained Autism to her.

(flashback)

_Rina bawled out loud for what appeared to be hours while Saki sat in her room with her to comfort her. "YOU'RE MEEEAAAAN!" Rina hoped Kyoya heard that. Finally, she calmed down. Saki sat down with her._

"_Rina. I think it's about time you learned why Riko is the way she is," Saki told her in her softest, gentlest voice possible._

"'_Cause she's weird and dumb, that's why!" Rina snapped tearfully._

"_No. She has Autism," Saki told her gently but sternly._

"_What's that? Is that a disease?"_

"_No. It's not a disease. It means Riko's brain didn't quite come out right when she was being born. Her brain takes in new information differently than normal. Not only that, she's more sensitive to certain things, like really loud noise," Saki explained as lucidly and calmly as possible. Rina made a contorted face like she was having trouble taking it all in._

"_Is that why she ruined my 5th birthday party?" Rina asked with a grumble._

"_No. She was just bothered by the rap music playing in the boom box, and you know I kept telling you to turn it down, but you refused to listen!" Saki explained, trying not to succumb to the urge to yell at her._

"_Whatever this autism thing is, she needs to get over it!" Rina sneered._

_Saki put both hands on Rina's shoulders and looked her straight in the eyes, which convinced Rina that her mother was in absolutely no mood for more of her attitude. "Rina. Listen to me. Autism doesn't go away like a cold. In fact, it stays with the person forever. There's no cure for it, so we have to learn to live with it. You're right in that Riko does tend to do odd things, like rock back and forth or flap her hands, but it's only to either calm herself down or make herself happy, not to weird people out or make you afraid of them, and having autism definitely doesn't mean they're not smart or have no feelings. It also doesn't mean they do nothing but scream and cry and not talk. There's a lot of successful autistic people out there who can function in the world just as well as normal people can. They just need a little bit more help and support, Riko included, but they still deserve just as much love and respect as everyone else on this planet does."_

"_But everyone at my last school said she's weird, and weird people-"_

"_They're wrong, Rina," Saki interjected. "They're wrong, and you need to get whatever they told you to believe out of your head, because they don't know Riko like we do."_

_Saki told Rina about the school Riko went to for second grade, how mean the teacher was, how Saki and Arinao tried to file a lawsuit against her and took her out of school, how traumatized Riko was, etc._

_This time, Rina listened intently, and was actually surprised by what she heard. At first, the concept seemed alien to her until memories she didn't think she had flashed into her mind, like times when she saw Riko storm into the house literally bawling her eyes out, crying about how kids and teachers were being mean for no reason. Memories of Saki and Arinao on the phone with people they seemed to hate, yelling at them and telling them they were wrong about Riko popped up as well. _

_Rina definitely remembered feeling sad when she saw Riko bawling and crying her eyes out over whatever it was that made her sad. Sometimes, Riko would cry for hours and she would see Arinao sitting silently with her, holding her close and stroking her back without stopping until she finally calmed down. It happened so often that Rina grew to find it annoying and began to openly tell Riko to stop bawling like a baby at whatever she was crying about, thinking she did it just to get attention._

"_So...she was never trying to annoy me at all?" That was all Rina could choke out._

"_No. You know Riko doesn't do anything for attention or to be a brat or make things bad for everyone. People at Yokosuka just thought she was because they're too stupid to understand that different doesn't mean bad. That's also something I really want you to understand, Rina. Just because someone's different or behaves in ways you think are weird or gross or odd, it does not mean they're bad, mean, or doing it to get attention or annoy you. Autistic people just need a little help in learning how the world works, and we have to be nice and clear when we do so, because sometimes they mishear words and think we're talking about something else," Saki explained further in a soft voice._

"_Does that mean...everything those kids at school taught me is wrong?" Rina's eyes watered again. She definitely wanted to cry this time, but chose not to._

"_I'm afraid it is, Rina. But we can learn something new from this. The school can help you work on improving your behavior for the better, so you can make friends and learn to treat people better. You may not like it, but there are times when we have to do and learn things we don't want to because it's good for us. I'm sure Riko would like that."_

(end flashback)

Rina was ardently convinced everything she did didn't hurt Riko. Everyone told her people like Riko aren't capable of understanding what's being said to them, no matter how mean it is. She's so stupid she can't understand a thing. She has no feelings. That's what they all told her. But how had she not realized that-though she is uncoordinated, somewhat clumsy, freaks out over little things-Riko is no different from other people she's met? That she actually understood all the mean things Rina said and felt even basic emotions like happy and sad. Was she truly that stupid to have assumed her autism made her older sister completely unable to understand that she made fun of her?

Rina thought about everything she had done to Riko. She's called her names, threw stuff at her, dropped a toy in a place she shouldn't have which caused Riko to trip and fall, berated her in public in order to make her look bad, blamed her for stuff she didn't do (and for messes Rina herself caused, like the chocolate milk covered Moomin doll incident), and even deliberately told people to avoid her. If other people did this to Riko in the past, but worse, then Rina realized she's turned into the very kind of person Riko doesn't just hate, but is absolutely terrified of.

No wonder Riko took everything she did extremely hard, unlike other siblings she saw. Rina basically recreated everything Riko wanted to get the heck away from once and for all, all because some stupid kids at school tricked her into believing they'd be her friend if she picked on her forever and ever. Rina buried her face into Miss Unicorn's fur and slammed her little fists in her, hoping the stuffing would come out. None did. Rina wished she wasn't so stupid and bratty.

How could she think that Riko was stupid when Rina is the one who never understood that she was hurting her? No, not just hurting her: literally tap dancing all over the emotional scars she sustained in school. But Rina wasn't there when Riko was being hated and mistreated by everyone and their mom. She was barely two years old. But not knowing about it still didn't justify deepening the scars Rina left on Riko.

Later on, she pulled herself out of Miss Unicorn's fur, leaped off her bed, ran out of her room, and darted toward Riko's room, where she found her lying face down on the floor, working on a project for school. She was gluing a printed out picture of a cat on a white, tri-fold presentation board. She wasn't using the bottled glue, but the glue stick. After she put it on the presentation board, she then proceeded to rub the pink end of the glue stick on the back of a paper she printed out, with lots of information on the cat and its history. Rina froze in place and clutched her skirt, unsure of whether she should approach her or not. Her project certainly looked good. She could see lots of pictures of cats glued on it. Rina balled her fists and walked into the room.

"Hi, Oneechan. Wanna play My Little Pony figures with me?" Rina asked in her nicest, gentlest voice possible.

"Sorry. I can't. I have to get this done. I have to present it tomorrow or I'll get a bad grade," Riko told her as she firmly pressed the paper onto the presentation board as hard as possible, hoping it'll stick.

"Okay. How about after you're done?" Rina asked again.

"Can't. I have more homework. I found out I have to study for a math test later, too," Riko said as she rubbed more glue on another piece of paper she printed out.

Rina looked down dejectedly. Her first attempt to be nice to Riko failed. _'Oh well. Maybe I'll do better next time. Mom says if I don't succeed at first, it's good to try again and again until you do,'_ Rina thought as she turned around to walk back to her room. _'But still...I wish she'd at least play with me. She never plays with me,'_ Rina thought again. At least she tried.

* * *

Friday came in like a lion, even though Riko wished this particular Friday would never come. She got her project finished, and brought it with her to present to her English class, but her entire body was covered with goosebumps, and she felt jittery all over just being there, knowing that she was going to get picked soon. She wished she could hide somewhere so she wouldn't go up there and have people laugh at her. Her mouth felt like it was glued completely shut, and she knew it'd be impossible to pry it open if she were to go up there.

She did, however, enjoy Fukiko's project about the lion and Chinami's project about the aardvark, which was still going on. But she still wished some Corrupt Sentinel would appear and wreck everything so she can become Cure Twilight and defeat it so she wouldn't have to go up and present her project.

"Lastly, aardvarks are nocturnal, which means they sleep during the day and are awake during the night, but there are some animals who stay awake during the day regardless of whether they're nocturnal or not. That's pretty much it," Chinami said. Nobody else seemed to care about her report other than Fukiko and the teacher, much to Riko's chagrin. One of the boys was picking his nose (gross!). Two girls were playing tic-tac-toe in a notebook. Another boy was drawing doodles on his desk, which she knows is against the rules. Riko wished they'd be more considerate.

"Thank you, Takayama-san. That was a very nice report," Mrs. Oginome told her as she went back to her seat. "Next up is Tasogare Riko."

"Booo!" A boy booed, which made Riko feel even more tense than before. Mrs. Oginome stomped over to his desk and glared at him.

"If I hear that out of you again, you're gonna get a detention! Do you hear me?" Riko covered her ears for a bit. The boy scoffed, crossed his arms, and looked away.

Riko wanted to go home. But she saw Chinami and Fukiko smiling at her, probably an attempt to cheer her up a bit. Nodding back, she picked up her project, set it up in front of the chalkboard, exhaled a sigh, and decided to try her hand at it. Everyone's eyes were on her, much to her inner horror. But she didn't dare express it lest she give them an excuse to laugh at her.

"Um...my report is on the cat," Riko began. She wondered if she stuttered a little, but she kept going. "They're the most common house pets around. Cats have been, uh...domesticated for about 10,000 years. Ancient Egyptians worshipped cats and considered them to be Gods, which is why they made things like the Sphinx. Sometimes they were mummified so they could be with their owners for all eternity."

She heard a snicker in the crowd. But she kept her voice loud and clear for all to hear...and possibly ignore. "They also mummified the rats they would eat so they'd have something to eat in the afterlife. Mice were a big problem back in the old days because they were dirty and carried diseases, so people tamed cats so they could be used to eat the mice, since cats typically eat mice. Cats are related to other species like tigers, lions, lynxes, leopards, cheetahs, and it's common ancestor, the African wild cat. Cats have many means of communication like meowing, hissing, purring, growling, and others depending, uh...on the situation."

Fukiko flashed a thumb's up. "Cats aren't nocturnal, but they can see just fine in the dark when hunting or trying to find food when needed. Their hearing is also very sensitive, and they can hear lots more sounds than humans and even dogs can. Cats also have their own way of taking a bath by licking their fur. Their tongues have prickly hooks on them that act like the ones you find on common hair brushes so it'll be easier to take the dirt out. And...that's about it."

Some kids clapped while others didn't. The teacher smiled at her. "Very good, Riko," Riko nodded and returned to her seat.

"Great job," Chinami whispered.

"You did great," Fukiko added.

"Thanks," Riko replied shyly. She wasn't sure if she deserved this praise. She was just happy to have gotten that project done and over with.

* * *

Before the day ended, Anzu called to ask if Riko would like to come to her house to hang out with everyone. Riko realized she had never been to Anzu's house before. She made sure to ask Saki first, and she actually said yes! Riko told Anzu about it and they agreed to meet at 12:00 PM. When Saturday finally opened its doors, Saki dropped Riko off at the address Anzu gave her: 14 Palmier Avenue.

From what Anzu told her, her house was big, yellow and green. It was very easy to spot. Anzu's house is huge, much bigger than all of the other houses on the entire street. It looked very much like a fancy house that rich people own. It wasn't as big as fancy as the houses on the house hunting shows her mother watches, but for a small neighborhood like this, it was pretty big. The house had a beige roof and lots of windows with dark, seaweed green shutters. The front door was red, but darker than her own front door. Soon, everyone else arrived, even Kyoya, and even they were frozen with awe at the sight of Anzu's huge house.

"Whoooaaa...your house is huge!" Riko exclaimed, awestruck.

Anzu blushed sheepishly. "It's not fancy or anything."

"Uh, yeah it is, Anzu. If this isn't fancy, I don't know what is," Kyoya said.

"Is your humble abode a mansion or a palace?" Starbeam asked.

"Meh. I've seen bigger, better, prettier ones," Lovebeam piped in with her arms crossed.

"Hey! You don't have to be so rude!" Sunbeam scolded.

"Hmph! I can say whatever I want!" Lovebeam argued.

"No you can't!" Sunbeam argued back.

"Calm down, you two," Hotaru pulled the two bickering fairy sisters apart and kept them at a safe distance from each other. Anzu invited them inside and the kids rolled right in. It helped that the porch was flat so Kyoya can roll right in without difficulty.

"Anyone want to play Jenga? I brought my box with me," Riko asked while pulling out her portable Jenga box.

Lovebeam scoffed. "Jenga's so boring! I can't believe you play something like that!" She exclaimed petulantly.

"Jenga's fun!" Marina protested. Lovebeam kept rambling on, but they ignored her and played anyway. They played the towering game of blocks for about an hour straight, laughing at whenever the tower of blocks would crumble under its own weight whenever there'd be too many blocks on it. The game stopped when Riko noticed something.

"Uhh...An-chan?"

"Yeah?"

"Are your parents home?"

"No," Anzu replied like it was the most normal thing in the world.

For Riko, however, the answer made her stand up in alarm. "What?! They're not?!" Riko was about to fly out the door until Marina stopped in front of her.

"What's your problem?!" Marina yelped angrily. "You should be happy she invited us here!"

"It's not that!" Riko argued. "My mom says people are not allowed to invite friends over when their parents aren't home! It's a rule! And we're breaking it!"

Marina facepalmed. "Get over it. It's not like we're gonna rob the place or anything."

"You're not helping, Marina," Moonbeam told her, not liking her answer.

"NO! Do NOT tell me to get over it! We're breaking a rule!" She was about to shout some more until Anzu calmly placed both hands on her shoulders.

"Calm down, Riko," Anzu told her gently. "My dad's at a get together, and he said I'm allowed to have friends over so long as we not have any wild parties and that we clean up after ourselves. He trusts me enough to let me stay in the house by myself, so it's okay."

Riko finally calmed down this time. "Sorry," Riko mused.

"You're such a baby to freak out over something as stupid as that," Lovebeam sneered before Sunbeam suddenly slapped one of her ears. "Ow!"

"You really need to stop saying stuff that hurts people's feelings!" Sunbeam scolded.

"I'm just telling it like it is!"

"It's just the way she is! There's no need to make such a big deal out of it!"

"Now now, girls. Please, don't fight. We're here to have fun," Moonbeam told them gently as she scooched in between them.

Thankfully, this gave Sunbeam an idea. "Oh! I know! An-chan, would it be okay if I used your kitchen for an eensy weensy moment?" Sunbeam asked Anzu sweetly.

"Sure. Just make sure not to make a big mess. But what for?" Anzu gave her permission, but felt a little flummoxed by the orange fairy's sudden question.

"I thought this might be a great time for me to demonstrate my cooking by making a big lunch for you all! Don't worry, I'll try not to make a big mess. I haven't been able to cook since I've come here, so I really want to right now," Sunbeam replied.

"You cook?" Kyoya asked.

Sunbeam nodded.

"This sounds interesting. What do you cook?" Hotaru asked, interested in Sunbeam's fiat.

"Lots of things! Mostly Rozanielan recipes, though. But if you have any simple recipes around, I think I might be able to get it just right," Sunbeam said.

"Wait here," Anzu said as she ran into the kitchen, opened a drawer, and pulled out a little book before handing it to Sunbeam. "This is my dad's cookbook. There's lots of recipes here if you want to try them out."

"Hooray! Thank you, An-chan!" Sunbeam flitted to Anzu and nuzzled her before skimming through the cookbook, looking for an easy recipe to put together for everyone. It didn't take long for one to catch her attention. "Ohh! This sounds like a good one! Do you have any spaghetti noodles and cans of meat sauce around?"

"Yep. They're in the cupboard up there," Anzu pointed to some cupboards in the kitchen. "The pots and pans are inside the oven so be sure to pull them out before you do anything."

"I'll do it," Hotaru said as she opened the oven and pulled out all of the pots and pans from within there. She then gently placed them in the dining room.

Sunbeam already felt at home in Anzu's kitchen, but Lovebeam crossed her little arms and scoffed. "I don't want to eat anything! I'm not hungry!" She pouted.

"It's just lunch," Starbeam told her. "And we'd all really appreciate it if you were a tad more grateful for the fact that we get to eat anything at all, and the fact that Anzu-san here has invited us to her humble abode for fun and pleasant times."

"I've been here lots of times before, so I don't need to be grateful!" Lovebeam snapped.

"Hey, Kyo-chan? Want to battle Pokemon with me?" Riko asked, pulling out her Nintendo DS.

"Oh, it's on!" Kyoya replied, accepting her challenge as he pulled out his own Nintendo DS.

As Riko and Kyoya played their games, Marina, Moonbeam, and Starbeam watched TV in the living room while Hotaru pulled out a book she brought with her: _Inspector Imanishi Investigates_(1).

Anzu and Lovebeam hung out on the kitchen to watch Sunbeam cook, and they were both surprised at the fact that she was pulling it off quite well. She put hot water in one of the pans, put it on the oven, turned one of the dials, and watched the water bubble after pouring in the spaghetti noodles. Both Anzu and Lovebeam watched intently as Sunbeam hummed while she cooked, pulling out carrots and carefully cutting them into pieces with the cooking knife without a cinch.

Sunbeam seemed to glow with a radiant light whenever she flitted around the kitchen, smiling and mixing some cookie dough with some chocolate chips she found. She then placed the cookies on the cookie sheet, gently slid it on the oven, closed it, and set it to thirty minutes.

'_For a fairy, she sure is good. Not only that...she looks so happy...so alive...'_ Anzu thought, a little awestruck by Sunbeam's cooking prowess. It made her happy to see Sunbeam radiant with happiness, especially considering everything that happened to her before and after she and her sisters came to Earth. Just watching Sunbeam happily flit around the kitchen doing whatever she wanted convinced Anzu that this is what makes her happy. Kind of like how she feels soothed by watching horror movies, oddly enough, cooking must be soothing to Sunbeam, bringing out her best. Sunbeam flitted around the cupboards to find cans of meat sauce, but oddly enough, she came up empty.

"An-chan? Do you know where the meat sauce is?" Sunbeam asked.

"There isn't any? Huh. I know Dad bought some last week," Anzu said as she looked into another one of the cupboards. Sunbeam's right. There aren't any cans of meat sauce around. Not in the top cupboards, not in the bottom cupboards, nowhere in the kitchen. "Maybe he stored some in the basement. I'll go check," Anzu said as she ran down some stairs into a basement.

Lovebeam, on impulse, began looking through the cupboards. She rummaged through some cans to find a small red bottle without any label on it, just some white, ripped up label fragments with nothing on them. She grabbed it and handed it to Sunbeam. "Here's some."

"Thanks, Lovebeam!" Sunbeam said cheerfully as she gratefully took the bottle.

Lovebeam found herself aglow with happiness, with a big, goofy smile painting her chubby pink face. _'Sunbeam finally said thank you to me! She finally appreciates what I did for her! Yay!'_ Lovebeam spun around in the air and returned to the living room with a light heart. But Marina happened to look through some DVDs with a very flummoxed look on her face.

"Jeez. Does Anzu watch anything _besides_ horror movies? Look! Sweeney Todd, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Halloween, Scary Movie, Audition, Ichi The Killer, Thirteen Ghosts, The Ring, The Exorcist, Carrie, Eraserhead, good God! There's nothing but horror movies in here!" Marina yelped, flabbergasted by the huge amount of horror movies Anzu had piled in her DVD shelf next to the big flat screen TV.

One DVD she held in her hand featured a man with a very frizzy, electric hair cut with a flummoxed look on his face in grayscale. However, Marina failed to notice various Doctor Who DVDs, DVDs like The Avengers, Game of Thrones, Spiderman, Batman The Animated Series, The 1939 Hunchback of Notre Dame movie, Phantom of the Opera, etc.

"I don't mind a horror movie once in a while. However, in regards to films, Rozaniela is very strict with looking over the content of a film and making sure nobody shows inappropriate films to people outside of the film's intended demographic," Starbeam explained. "In fact, we have laws that prohibit giving children access to movies beyond their age. If someone who has children purchases a movie that they themselves want to watch-the adults, I mean-parents are expected to keep movies that may be inappropriate for children locked away so tightly and so securely that no child can have any form of access to them, even if they devise methods to undo the locks, to the point where children aren't cognizant of the fact that the DVDs exist in their household."

"Isn't that going a little overboard?" Kyoya asked.

"I personally agree, but these measures are taken so children can be prepared to stomach content like that once they're old enough, even though films are merely fictional pieces," Starbeam elaborated further. "Oh, but it's not like the Queen and King and the other citizens are trying to lie to the children or claim that things like sadness and suffering don't exist. In fact, we read lots of stories or show movies to them that have somber and melancholy moments. We definitely don't try to insult their intelligence or make them believe the world is all fun and rainbows. No place is ever truly peaceful or without flaws."

"I like your logic," Riko piped in.

"Hmph! It's just like Starbeam to talk talk talk about stupid, boring mumbo gumbo!" Lovebeam complained upon re-entering the living room.

After a while, the cookies and spaghetti were finally ready to be consumed. But Sunbeam didn't put anything on the spaghetti right off, as she wanted to ask what everyone wanted on it before putting anything on. Riko requested meatballs, and Anzu promptly gave her some. Sunbeam cooked some up in advance while waiting for the cookies to bake. But when Hotaru requested just meat sauce, Sunbeam took the red bottle Lovebeam gave her and was about to pour it on the yellow, limp noodles until Marina suddenly stood up in alarm.

"Wait!" Marina yelped, causing everyone to freeze with surprise.

"What's wrong?" Moonbeam asked.

"That doesn't look like meat sauce to me," Marina said as she walked over to Sunbeam. "Do you mind if I borrowed that real quick?"

"Uhh...sure," Sunbeam told her as she handed her the bottle, albeit still very flummoxed. Marina took the bottle in her hand and examined it with her piercing golden eyes. She then opened it, placed a very tiny drop of the red contents on the very tip of her index finger, and sucked on it. As soon as the red substance dropped on her tongue, it felt like it was set on fire. Marina jumped around, her face contorting with pain as she put the bottle down, grabbed a plastic cup, put water in it, and scarfed it down. Thankfully, the torrents of water washed away the scorching burning sensation.

"Man, I like hot sauce and all, but that's just too hot for me!" Marina exclaimed.

"Wait, what?" Moonbeam asked.

"This isn't meat sauce. It's hot sauce. Meat sauce isn't kept in bottles shaped like this. They're mostly in jars or aluminum cans."

"ACK!" Lovebeam yelped this time, her hands flying to her face with horror. "That was hot sauce?!"

"Yeah. There's no label on it," Marina explained as she showed them the bottle.

Sunbeam's chubby orange face suddenly turned beet red like she was about to explode into a shower of hot sauce. She flew toward Lovebeam-probably to hit her-but Hotaru pulled her out of the way just in time. It didn't simmer the orange fairy's anger, however. Instead, it made her even more angry, confirmed by the fact that her blue eyes are bloodshot. "You idiot! You almost made me kill everybody!" Sunbeam screamed angrily, causing Riko to cover her ears.

"Hey! Keep it down!" Anzu snapped.

"I'm sorry! I didn't mean to-"

"NO YOU'RE NOT! You probably gave me hot sauce on purpose so you could make me look bad and ruin everything!" Sunbeam wasn't even bothering to listen.

"I didn't know it was hot sauce! Really, and I was NOT trying to ruin everything! Mari-chan just said there's no label on it!" Lovebeam yelled back, feeling her heart be ripped to pieces by Sunbeam's venomous, dagger sharp, insinuating words.

"Knock it off, you two!" Hotaru exclaimed as she got in between the two fairies. "Sunbeam. I understand you're angry, but I'm sure Lovebeam meant no harm. Like Marina said, there's no label on the bottle, so anyone could have mistaken it for something else. Calling her names and accusing her of being heartless isn't nice," Hotaru told her calmly but sternly.

Sunbeam wasn't buying it. "Stop sticking up for her! You don't know her like I do! She always wants attention, doesn't care one bit about the feelings of other people, and never takes responsibility for anything she does wrong!"

"Yes I do!" Lovebeam argued in regards to that last statement. "I just said I'm sorry!"

"That's not gonna cut it, you spoiled brat! You're lucky Mari-chan noticed in time!" Sunbeam argued again. The ferocious look on her face told the frightened, pink fairy that Sunbeam was in no mood to accept her apology.

"I found the real meat sauce!" Moonbeam exclaimed, holding a can of meat sauce that was about her size.

Hotaru smiled and looked at the two fairies with a kind gaze. "See? Nobody was hurt, so let's put this issue to rest and have a nice lunch."

Sunbeam scoffed but she sat down and ate lunch anyway. Lovebeam didn't scoff, as an expression full of sadness washed over her face, stealing her appetite like a thief. But she ate Sunbeam's spaghetti and cookies anyway. She had to admit, they were quite warm and delicious.

"Wow, Sunbeam! These cookies are deeee-lish! Meow!" Riko mused happily.

"Thanks. Glad you like them," Sunbeam told her grimly as she ate a wad of spaghetti.

"Hey, Anzu. I notice you have a buttload of horror movies in your shelf. Are those all you ever watch?" Marina asked.

Anzu sweatdropped. "Sorta. Guilty as charged. I'm a sucker for horror movies."

"Do they scare you?" Hotaru asked.

"Nope! I'm not scared of them, and I never puked when I saw any of them!" Anzu edicted proudly.

"I saw a snippet of The Exorcist once on TV, and I was so scared I slept with the lights on for the whole month! It gave me nightmares!" Marina proclaimed.

"You look like you're not afraid of anything," Riko piped in.

"Man, this stuff is great!" Kyoya exclaimed cheerfully as he ate a roll of spaghetti on his fork.

After they finished the rest of the wonderful lunch Sunbeam made, they went about doing other things, like watching anime, playing Jenga, playing air hockey in Anzu's basement, and watching funny videos on YouTube (nothing lewd or violent).

Later on, Marina had to go home because her mother called. Hotaru and Kyoya left as well, leaving Anzu, Riko, and Lovebeam alone in the house. Later, Anzu's father called with some bad news. His car broke down and can't get home until much later, but he said he managed to call someone to help him out. When Saki came to pick Riko up, she noticed her father's absence. "Where's your father, Anzu-chan?"

"He called me and said the car broke down. He got help, but he said he won't be back for a while," Anzu explained.

"I see. In that case, would you like to come to our house for dinner?" Saki asked politely.

Riko and Anzu looked at each other with twin shocked expressions. Then Anzu turned back to Saki. "Is that okay? I mean, I don't want to intrude…"

"It's almost five o'clock, and I don't think your father would want you to go without dinner," Saki reasoned.

"I see," Anzu had to admit, Saki had a good point. Her father said his car broke down, and God only knows how long it'll take for him to come home, wherever he is. "Thanks. I'd love to come. But can I call my dad first and let him know?"

"Sure. We'll wait here," Saki said before Anzu bolted into the house to get the phone and call her father. When she dialed the number, it rang three times until she heard her father's voice.

"_Anzu? Is that you?"_ A male voice asked.

"Hi, Dad. It's me again. I just wanted to let you know, one of my friends invited me to their house for dinner, and I was wondering if I could go," Anzu told him.

"_Really? That's wonderful, honey! Of course you can go. I don't know how long this'll take, and I don't want you to go without dinner, so go and enjoy yourself. I'm only sorry this whole mess happened and I can't be there right now. Gosh, it's days like this I wish I could teleport,"_ Anzu's father exclaimed happily.

"That's okay. Stuff just happens and we can't control it. I get it. Thanks. I'll be sure to get home before it's dark. Okay?"

"_Keep your house key with you, and leave some lights on in the house. Oh, and keep your cell phone with you! I'll call you when I get a ride home, okay?"_

"Okay. Bye, Dad."

"_Bye, sweetie. Have fun!"_

With that, Anzu hung up the house phone, grabbed her brand new cell phone, Nintendo DS, some games, and her house key, turned some lights on in the house, and went to Riko's house.

"When did you get a cell phone?" Lovebeam whispered.

"Yesterday. Dad got it for me while I was at school. I can give you my number if you want," Anzu explained.

"Sure! I have paper at home so you can write it down when we get there," Riko said.

When they arrived, the first thing Riko did was grab a piece of paper and a pen for Anzu to write down her new cell phone number on. Since Saki went into the den to watch some more shows about buying houses, Hikage was upstairs doing homework, and Rina was in her room playing Barbies, Lovebeam found it okay to go into the kitchen.

"Hey, An-chan! Let's battle our Pokemon!" Riko suggested.

"Oh, it's on!" Anzu said as she and Riko bolted up the stairs to Riko's room, completely forgetting that Lovebeam was in the refrigerator eating a piece of chocolate cake. She scarfed the whole thing down, and as a result, she has chocolate smudges all around her little mouth.

"Chocolate cake may be fattening and not good for my complexion, but it sure is good!" Lovebeam mused to herself as she got a napkin to wipe the chocolate off her face. She then threw the foamy box it came in in the trash, along with the chocolate covered napkin, and followed Anzu and Riko to the latter's bedroom. Just in time, too, as once she got in there, Rina trotted out of the room with a Barbie.

"Mom says I can't eat it until after dinner, but I want that cake now!" Rina mused to herself mischievously as she trotted down the stairs, hoping to eat that oh so delicious slice of rich chocolate cake.

With a smile and a heart full of anticipation and wanting, she opened the big refrigerator door to see if the foamy box with the cake in it was still in there...however, her smile faded when she found that it wasn't. But her split second sorrow then turned to anger when she pulled out the trash can to find the foamy box in there instead! Empty with nothing but chocolate smudges on the bottom.

With a face glowing red with anger, she stomped to the one place where she thought the culprit was hiding.

"RIKOOOOO!"

"Yeep!" The yelling was so sudden that Riko dropped her Nintendo DS, causing it to fall on her legs. Without knocking, Rina barged into the room and stomped over to the frightened Riko. "Was that you yelling just now?"

"Admit it, you pig! You ate that chocolate cake, didn't you?!" Rina yelled. Lovebeam went into stuffed animal mode.

"Isn't it still in the refrigerator?" Riko asked, confused.

"NO! It's gone! And YOU ate it! I know it!" Rina yelled.

"No I didn't! I just got here!"

"Yes you did! Stop lying, you piggy!"

"I'm not lying, and stop calling me a pig!"

"Yes you are! You're so rude and inconsiderate!"

"I didn't even eat it!"

"Yes you did! Now I can't have any and it's all your fault, you fat piggy!"

"Hey! It's rude to call your sister names!" Anzu said.

"MOOOOM! Riko ate the last piece of cake before dinneeeeeer!" Rina ran out of the room and yelled for Saki. Riko facepalmed.

"What's her problem?" Anzu asked.

"That was her chocolate cake?" Lovebeam asked.

Riko and Anzu turned to the lop eared fairy. "Wait. How do you know about it?" Riko asked.

"Because I ate it just now," Lovebeam confessed like she was having a normal conversation with someone.

"WHAAAT?!" Riko yelped. "Why?! I was gonna eat it after dinner!"

"I just wanted to!" Lovebeam said.

"You can't just go through someone's fridge and eat their food! If you wanted some, you could have just asked first!" Riko scolded, her own face turning beet red with a touch of anger, not to the extent of Rina's, though.

"But you would have said no!" Lovebeam protested.

"Shh! They're coming!" Anzu hushed, which made Lovebeam hide under Riko's bed. Rina stomped back into Riko's bedroom with Saki with her.

"Riko ate the chocolate cake before dinner! She's rude and inconsiderate!" Rina yelled loud enough for everyone to hear, causing Riko to cover her ears, unabashedly pointing at her like she was accusing her of robbing a bank.

"Rina. Calm down. It's just food. There's no need to make a big scene about it," Saki told her calmly, but Rina wouldn't listen.

"But I wanted that cake and she ate it!" Rina stamped her feet to emphasize how angry she was.

"I didn't eat it, I swear!" Riko protested.

"But you're the only one who really likes chocolate cake, and Hikage's been in his room all day. I don't mind if you did, but it's good to share it with others," Saki told her.

"I told you, I didn't eat it!" Riko protested again.

"Liar liar pants on fire!"

Anzu stood up. "I ate it."

"No you didn't!" Rina exclaimed. Lovebeam watched from underneath the bed, with awe making her purple eyes twinkle.

"Yes I did. Riko asked me if I wanted some, and I said yes, so I ate it. I'm sorry," Anzu told them before giving an apologetic bow. Lovebeam couldn't believe what Anzu was doing for her sake. She hid her face in her long, fluffy ears.

Saki smiled. "Okay then. That was nice of you, Riko. That settles it-"

"Nuh-uh! Riko ate it! She's a big fat piggy who's always eating everyone else's food when she shouldn't, and that's rude!" Rina yelled, not believing Anzu's lie. Riko facepalmed. She knew Rina wouldn't believe something like that, even though she knew for a fact that her little sister is the most gullible person on earth if what her teachers were saying were true.

"Rina. Enough. It's just food, and stop calling Riko names or you won't get to play Barbies for the rest of the night. Understand me?" Saki told her sternly, not pleased with her stubborn attitude. Rina pouted, crossed her arms, and stomped out of the room like a brat.

"I wanted that cake!" Rina shouted before slamming the door to her bedroom. Saki left the room to start dinner, which allowed Anzu and Riko to exhale sighs of relief. Lovebeam creeped out from underneath the bed looking remorseful as she kneaded one of her ears into a roll.

"I'm sorry. It looked delicious," Lovebeam murmured sadly.

"It's okay. Just ask if you want something, okay?" Riko told her.

"But people always say no when I ask for stuff!" Lovebeam said.

"An-chan? Why'd you lie to Mom? You didn't have to do that," Riko asked.

"Uh, yeah I did. I wasn't gonna sit there and let your brat of a sister accuse you of something you didn't do. Besides, Lovebeam would have gotten it the worst if they found out she did it," Anzu explained.

"Thank you for doing that," Lovebeam told her shyly. However, as soon as she said that, her long ears suddenly stood straight up in alarm, facing the ceiling. "Oh no! I sense a Corrupt Sentinel nearby!"

Riko groaned. "Seriously?! Can't we catch a break?!"

"Good thing I brought my Heart Lighter," Anzu said.

"But Mom and Oniichan are here. What do we do about them?" Riko asked.

"We're gonna have to take a chance on this one," Anzu said as she pulled out her Heart Lighter.

* * *

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Cure Dusk fired a flaming arrow at a very large black badger, which knocked the flaming arrow away like it was trash. With a yell, Cure Dusk tried to land a kick on it, only for the badger to knock her against a tree with its nose. Moonbeam, Sunbeam, and Starbeam shot beams of light at the badger, but it knocked them away with its nose as well. Using the wings on her shoes, Cure Dusk charged and landed a hard punch on the badger.

Cure Starlight and Decebal were fighting with their respective weapons; Decebal wielding his rapier, Hotaru her naginata. They tried to slash at each other, but they just kept on either evading or blocking each other's attacks. It didn't help that Decebal found an opening and knocked Cure Starlight's naginata out of her hand, causing it to roll on the sidewalk. But that didn't stop her, as she decided to try and land some punches and kicks on the green haired man. Unfortunately, he kept either evading or grabbing her fists and feet. At one point, he grabbed her arm and threw her over his back, causing her to fall flat on her face. She heard a crack. She pulled herself up to rub some gravel off her nose only to find a warm liquid streaming down her nose. Shiny red spots of blood appeared on her fingers.

"That's what you get for being a naughty little girl," Decebal told her condescendingly. "It's such a shame that beautiful face of yours had to be ruined like that, but it is your own fault for not knowing your place!"

"You're one to talk!" Cure Starlight sneered as she hopped back to her feet, wiped the blood off her face with her arm, and attempted to land a few more punches on him. He did some swift back flips to dodge them and then use the back of his rapier to knock one of Cure Starlight's shoes right off her left foot.

"Starlight!" Moonbeam flew over to the blue Pretty Cure with concern in her silver eyes.

"I'm not giving up just yet! Dusk Medley!" Cure Dusk fumed as she fired a barrage of blazing musical notes at the badger, who just knocked them away like they were flies. One of the fiery musical notes hit the brick wall of a house, leaving a charred mark on it. Another one fell on a pot of flowers, knocking it over and spilling some dirt and pansies, bereaving them of their beautiful, fragile foliage.

"Careful, Dusk!" Sunbeam exclaimed before getting swatted against a tree by the big black badger. "Ow!"

"Sunbeam!" Starbeam flew behind Sunbeam and managed to catch her before she could hit the nearest tree. "You have not sustained any fatal injuries, have you?"

"No, I'm good," Sunbeam told her.

Decebal pointed her rapier at Cure Starlight, who glared at him, unafraid and unwilling to concede defeat. Even without her left shoe, she got back on her feet while Moonbeam stayed in between her and the shiny, pointy rapier. Despite trembling and feeling like wanting to run away, she stayed in mid-air, frozen, unwilling to let the green haired man hurt her friend.

"Out of my way, you pest!" Decebal demanded.

"No! We want answers and we want them now! Why did you let Zenjin have the Energia?! You realize undoing the security systems is a serious crime, don't you?!" Moonbeam demanded with just as much gusto.

"Do I look like I care about what those hypocrites Ghislain and Malgorzata think?! They can go to Hades for all I care!" Decebal bellowed as he tried to slash the little purple bunny, but Hotaru grabbed his rapier and threw it to another part of the street.

"Starlight Shower!" Cure Starlight made a rain of stars fall on both Decebal and the badger. But Decebal grabbed his rapier and used it to knock away some of her blue stars. Not only that, the badger seemed unaffected.

"Just give up," Decebal said.

"Stop right there, you fiend!" The booming voice of Cure Dawn echoed, drawing everyone's attention to two girls leaping off the roof of a house and descending onto the street. Out came Cures Dawn and Twilight, with Lovebeam at their side. Cure Dawn drew out her nunchucks and Cure Twilight unsheathed her silver cat claws.

"Sorry we're late, girls!" Cure Twilight exclaimed as she slashed the badger's fur with her claws as it tried to grab Cure Dusk with its hands.

"Took you long enough!" Cure Dusk complained.

Cure Dawn wasted no time with an attack. "Golden Dawn Explosion!" The blast was so powerful that it managed to completely consume the badger and char its already black fur. It tried to get back up, but it collapsed onto the ground. This provided a great opportunity for the Pretty Cure and the fairies to form their usual circle.

"Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!"

With that, the badger disappeared, leaving behind a brown colored orb. "I'll get that!" Kyoya wheeled toward the orb, picked it up, wheeled to the unconscious homeless man lying in some bushes, and dropped the orb into his Soul Portal.

But before they could rejoice in their victory, a black and purple ball of light suddenly shot at them, sending the girls and fairies in different directions. Kyoya was not within the energy blast's range, so he managed to not get sent flying. When the dust cloud cleared, a huge pot hole dotted the street, along with the silver haired person responsible for the energy blast just now.

"Hey, Decebal! These Pretty Cure trash messing with you again?"

Dusk facepalmed popped out of the leafy tree. "Oh great! Zenjin's back!"

Zenjin stood next to Decebal. "Good job in ambushing them like that. I take it you've come to gather information with me?"

"Yeah, plus I'm bored out of my mi-" Before Zenjin could finish, a tiny, blurry, pink tornado suddenly flew right out of nowhere and socked Zenjin in the face so hard he slipped and fell on his rear end. "OWW!" It didn't even stop there, as floppy ears kept hitting him and slapping him in the face. With an angry glint in his eyes, he grabbed the pink tornado by the ears, which turned out to be a very angry Lovebeam.

"That's what you get for hurting my little sister, you bully!" Lovebeam yelled as she shot a beam of light at his face, freeing her from his grasp.

"Lovebeam! What the freak are you doing?!" Cure Dawn yelped as she tried to grab her, but Decebal shot a beam of light at her, knocking her onto the street.

"Dawn!" Cure Twilight, Sunbeam, and Moonbeam ran to the yellow cure's aid. Cure Dawn found a bloody scab on her elbow, along with some gravel sticking to it.

Zenjin covered his face with one of his hands, his anger growing exponentially. "That is the LAST time you tarnish my beautiful face, you pink saccharine TRASH!" Zenjin screamed hysterically as he shot another beam of light at Lovebeam, who evaded it and proceeded to bite his arm, the part that wasn't covered by his black sleeves. Her teeth dug into his skin, and Zenjin yelled and flailed his arm around in an attempt to throw her off.

"GET OFF ME!" Zenjin yelled as he flung Lovebeam around to throw her off, but to no avail.

"Twilight Serenade!" Finding an opening, Cure Twilight shot an attack at both Zenjin and Decebal. In his anger, Zenjin threw up a barrier, negating the purple cure's attack. Once it dissipated, Cure Starlight grabbed Lovebeam and pried her off of Zenjin's now marked arm before he could do anything to her. This gave Cure Dusk an opportunity to try a Dusk Medley on them, but Decebal got his rapier and knocked them all away.

"Lovebeam. Are you alright?" Cure Starlight asked as Lovebeam flew out of her arms irritably.

"Why'd you do that?! I wanted to kick his butt!" Lovebeam whined angrily.

"Because you almost got yourself killed! You need to think a little! You can't be so reckless all the time!" Sunbeam scolded. She wanted to do some more until Zenjin shot a beam of light at her.

The girls then noticed that Decebal was flying right toward Lovebeam with an outstretched hand. Lovebeam found herself frozen in the air, unable to move. But before Decebal could grab her, a light blue blur suddenly appeared in front of her, allowing itself to be caught in Decebal's grasp.

A light blue blur with a green ribbon.

"STARBEAM!" Kyoya screamed as he wheeled onto the scene.

"Why do you interfere, you puffball?" Decebal asked as he squeezed the now helpless Starbeam in his hands.

"I won't let you...lay a hand...on my sisters…" Starbeam croaked weakly.

"LET HER GO!" Cure Twilight, Sunbeam, and Moonbeam all tried to launch combined attacked on Decebal in order to save Starbeam, but Zenjin shot another energy blast at them, making them all roll on the concrete in a puff of smoke. A wheelchair rolled into the cloud. Decebal found himself floating in the air, but not too far up, just about two feet.

"You may be worthless, but I don't see anything wrong with taking you with me-" Decebal said maliciously until he felt something heavy on him, like he was carrying extra weight. He tried to fly further, but he couldn't, as something was dragging him down. He looked down to find a red haired boy climbing on his coat, with courage blazing in his green eyes.

"KYO-CHAN NOOO!" Cure Twilight yelled.

"Give her back!" Kyoya tried to grab at Starbeam but Decebal stamped a hand on the boy's bespectacled face in an attempt to push him off. He even tried pushing his foot on the boy's stomach, but Kyoya kept clutching to his 17th century garb, trying desperately to grab Starbeam and save her.

"Get off of me! How did you even-?!"

"I won't let you take her!"

"Can we just leave?!" Zenjin suggested as Cure Dusk attempted a Dusk Medley on them again. But the silver haired boy punched all of the fiery musical notes back at her, knocking her out.

"Starlight Shower!"

"Twilight Sparkle!"

Unfortunately for Cures Starlight and Twilight, their attacks didn't hit them, as Zenjin and Decebal disappeared into thin air.

Taking Starbeam and Kyoya with them.

"NOOOOO!" Cure Twilight fell on her knees and screamed as she banged her fist on the concrete. She found herself trembling after beating the concrete five times. Soon, her eyes began to blur and turn wet with tears. Cure Dusk kicked a nearby tree with a loud grunt.

"I can't believe it! They took Starbeam and Kyoya! And we were too weak to stop them!" Cure Dusk grunted irritably, balling her fists and then landing a punch on the tree she just kicked.

"Starbeam's gone! What do we do?!" Moonbeam wailed sadly. Despite being exhausted, Cure Dawn walked up to the now bawling Cure Twilight, kneeled to her level, and put a gentle hand on her back.

"It'll be okay. We'll get them back," Cure Dawn told her gently and softly, hoping to reassure her. Unfortunately, her attempt to pacify Riko didn't work.

"What if something terrible happens to them?! Zenjin can do anything with the Energia! What if he kills them?! Or eats them?! Or erases them or the world from existence?! If anything happens to them it'll be our fault!" Cure Twilight wailed hysterically, hitting her head with her fists. Cure Dawn grabbed her before she could do any more.

"Don't do that! You'll hurt yourself!" Cure Dawn exclaimed. Sunbeam had the same idea as Marina, as she suddenly began throwing rocks around, making sure to avoid hitting people.

"Dawn is right. We need to calm down and tell Queen Malgorzata about this. Perhaps she can help us in this endeavor," Cure Starlight told them calmly as she wiped her broken nose of any remaining blood.

Unbeknownst to them, Lovebeam was sitting on the concrete, her lavender eyes wide with horror, frozen with the image of what happened just now. Lovebeam felt Zenjin deserved to get some payback for hurting Sunbeam the way he did, but she got reckless, and as a result, Starbeam was kidnapped.

Lovebeam covered her face with her long, floppy ears, wishing this was all a dream, an illusion, a terrible prank. Lovebeam couldn't accept this reality. The fact that her home was destroyed was hard enough to face. Lovebeam shook herself violently, wishing this whole thing was a farce.

But even she knew this isn't a farce. It's real. Very real.

Footnotes:

1\. Inspector Imanishi Investigates (original title Suna no Utsuwa) is a novel by Seicho Matsumoto.


	18. Lovebeam To The Rescue!

Chapter 18: Lovebeam to the Rescue! She isn't so bratty after all!

Starbeam was the first to wake up. The floor beneath her felt rather cold and dirty, like it had been collecting dust for decades. Lots of dust particles floated in the air, made real by the sunbeams penetrating some of the broken glass windows. Starbeam rubbed her weary green eyes and found that she and Kyoya-who was next to her, still unconscious-were in the interior of a warehouse.

The wall behind them mostly consisted of windows, most of which were either broken with some glass shards lying around, or covered with graffiti. Some of the support beams had graffiti on them, along with other walls. Brown and black rusty pipes traveled around the ceiling, no longer in use. With worry stirring in her heart, Starbeam turned around and shook Kyoya's back with her tiny little hands.

"Kyo-chan! Please! You must wake! Kyo-chan!" Starbeam pleaded as she shook his back. Thankfully, Kyoya stirred a little, resulting in his green eyes finally peeling open. His glasses were still on his face, but his wheelchair was no longer in sight. When Kyoya opened his eyes, he saw a blue blur which didn't look familiar at first, until his eyesight began to become clearer. He felt his head pulsate as he sat himself up.

"Starbeam?" Kyoya murmured wearily as he rubbed his eyes. "What the…" When Kyoya finally took in his surroundings, he froze upon relieving the last thing he remembered: grabbing Decebal, trying to save Starbeam, getting teleported, and feeling some kind of blow to the back of his neck, knocking him out. "Starbeam! You okay?!"

"I haven't sustained any physical injuries, and neither have you, so it seems we are both physically fine for now. But the question is...where are we now?" Starbeam told him worriedly, clinging to his sleeve. Images of her sisters and the Pretty Cure flashed through her mind. "My sisters must be killing themselves with incessant worry."

Kyoya looked out one of the windows behind him. All he saw were some cars going back and forth, along with some people who were small like ants, which told Kyoya that wherever they were, they were really high up. It didn't help that it was really noisy down there, so even if they could call for help, their cries would be drowned out by the noises of the bustling crowds down below and the cars going back and forth. But seeing these cars and people did tell him one thing. "We might still be on Earth."

"Yes, that's true," A voice told them from behind. With defensive stances, Kyoya and Starbeam turned around to find Decebal in front of them, flanked by Beileag and Zenjin. Kyoya grabbed Starbeam and clutched her like he was a parent trying to protect his child, giving the trio of Rozanielans an icy stare.

"What do you want with us?!"

"For what purpose did you kidnap Kyo-chan and I? I demand you tell us right this instant!" Starbeam edicted boldly. Although she yelled like a brave person, her insides were either trembling violently or doing back flips. But instead of answering right off, Beileag crept closer and examined Kyoya with her star shaped glasses, her eyes gleaming with curiosity.

"Wooow! You're right, Zen-chan! This kid DOES look a lot like you before you dyed your hair and eyes! Only this kid's hair is much lighter and his eyes are green. But I have to admit, you sure are handsome!" Beileag squealed cheerfully like a happy little girl. Kyoya really didn't like how close she was in his personal space, but he and Starbeam kept giving them angry stares.

Zenjin facepalmed. Decebal sighed before telling her, "Focus, Beileag. You're not here to hit on him. You'll get arrested."

"Boo! I wasn't hitting on him!" Beileag complained before crossing her arms. "There's a difference between admiring someone's physical beauty and hitting on someone! And stop calling me Beileag!"

"Can't we blow him up? I want to see his blood and organs fly all over the place!" Zenjin sneered as he made a small ball of energy appear in his hand. Just hearing him say that made Starbeam shudder with fear.

"That's being a bit hasty, don't you think?" Decebal said as he made the ball of energy disappear with a snap of his fingers.

"Awww, come on! I wanna do away with this worthless piece of trash!" Zenjin yelled. "It's more fun that way!"

"If you ever lay a hand on him, you have to deal with me!" Starbeam hissed angrily, appalled by Zenjin's complete lack of restraint and inhibitions. Even Kyoya couldn't help but be appalled at the fact that Zenjin finds killing people to be fun, treating it like it's a game without regard for human life. Granted, Kyoya never did see what he had done, but considering all the damage he did on Rozaniela that he did see and the fact that he has a jewel that can do the impossible, he was probably capable of doing much worse things than decimating a planet.

"Zenjin. Go and gather information. You needn't stray from your objective," Decebal told him in a whisper.

"Uuuuugh! Fine," Zenjin groaned as he teleported away.

"What do you mean by gathering information?" Kyoya asked, keeping his fierce eyes fixated on them.

"It's rude to stick your nose in business where it doesn't belong. It's why you wound up here in the first place," Decebal told him coldly.

"Cut the garbage! Why are you and your lackeys terrorizing our town and turning people's souls into giant animals?! What did we ever do to you that was so bad?!" Kyoya yelled angrily, the fierce glint in his eyes blazing.

"You know as well as we do that even if we do tell you, you'll tell the Pretty Cure about it and they'll be able to thwart our plans, and we can't let that happen, now can we?" Decebal told him condescendingly.

"Aren't they gonna try and thwart your plans anyway?"

"Shut up, you pitiful creature!" Decebal yelled as he pointed his rapier at the boy, but this only exacerbated his anger.

"You're the ones who are pitiful!" Kyoya snapped, completely ignoring the rapier pointing at his neck.

All of a sudden, Starbeam threw herself right at Decebal's face, knocking him to the floor, causing his rapier to slip out of his hands and clatter on the floor. Before he knew it, he himself became beet red with anger, even as he locked eyes with Starbeam, who floated in front of Kyoya, giving him a very fierce glare that told him that she was not going to let him hurt Kyoya. However, Decebal suddenly pointed his finger at the blue fairy. Kyoya gasped when he saw a flickering blue spark of lightning flash across the green haired man's gloved finger.

"Starbeam!" Kyoya screamed as he grabbed Starbeam and threw her across the room. Before he could do anything else, he suddenly felt huge jolts of electricity rushing all throughout his body, burning him on the inside, making him emit a bloodcurdling scream. Starbeam's eyes widened in horror as the boy became consumed by flashing electric blue lightning, screaming for his life, probably in excruciating pain.

"KYO-CHAN!" Starbeam wailed, horrified at the sight. "STOP! PLEASE! WE BEG OF YOU!"

Decebal put down his hand and the electricity faded, causing the red haired boy to fall on the ground in a crumpled heap. Starbeam ran to his aid, but she realized her first aid kit wasn't with her. She cursed at herself for being unable to help him.

"That was a bit extreme, don't you think, Decebal? You could have killed him, and we could get arrested!" Beileag told him with a concerned voice.

"Don't worry. He won't die. I know when to hold back," Decebal hissed.

"You call that holding back?! He's just a child! Why would you even do that to him?! He never did anything to you! What did Rozaniela ever do to you that warranted stealing the Energia and committing worldwide genocide?! I DEMAND AN ANSWER NOW!" Starbeam screamed in her highest voice possible.

"Why DID we steal the Energia anyway?" Beileag asked out of the blue. "You never did tell me why we're doing all of this in the first place."

At first, Decebal said nothing, which prompted Starbeam to continue with her tirade. "King Ghislain trusted you with his whole heart! You were his most trusted confidant! He was your best friend...and yet...you had to go and betray him, just like Zenjin hurt Sunbeam! Do you feel no remorse for your machinations?! Why would you betray the king like that?! Why did you help Zenjin destroy most of Rozaniela?!"

"You want to know why, you useless little teddy bear?" Decebal asked, putting his rapier back in its sheath. His red eyes developed a scornful sheen to them. "Because I hate your planet's policies! Stealing people from Earth, brainwashing them into believing there is no suffering or sadness, coddling everyone with lies, and all this saccharine talk about kindness and happiness! This planet's sole existence makes me sick! The King and Queen are a bunch of fuzzy brained fools! They rule over their denizens by brainwashing them into thinking everything is all happy smiles and that everything will go well for them if they're good and naive and stupid! That is NOT the way a living thing should live!"

Starbeam couldn't believe what she was hearing. He kept going. "It is only through hardship, suffering, and sadness that we know who we really are! Humans are at their best when faced with adversity, with sadness, everything! But you hypocrites obviously don't want to subject your poor little children to such traumatizing truths, now do you? So you brainwash them with all these lies about how they'll be happy on this saccharine planet where everything's all perfectly rosy and happy and everybody gets everything they want handed to them on a silver platter!"

"That's NOT true, and you know it!" Starbeam argued fiercely. "If we really wanted to hide the fact that suffering and sadness exist, then we wouldn't be encouraging them to read stories like Dog of Flanders or Anne of Green Gables! And our ancestors didn't create Rozaniela to brainwash people! They made it to be a safe haven for people who were miserable and suffering so we could help them heal! They wanted to give love and largess to the orphans they saved, because Earth never gave them any!"

"That's exactly what I mean, you twit!" Decebal pointed his rapier at her again. "That's the main problem! You steal them from their home and don't allow them to see for themselves what sadness and suffering is! You don't let them overcome it themselves! That's what makes a strong human being! We cannot live our lives without sadness or hardship. But you and all the others...you only care about planting seeds of lies in their heads and do everything humanly possible to shield them from every possible trace of sadness and suffering in favor of shoving saccharine everyone is happy beliefs in their heads because, _'Oh! We can't possibly show them anything with suffering in it! Their poor little souls will be traumatized for life! How scandalous!'_ You make me sick!"

Starbeam couldn't resist the urge to facepalm right as he began using a fake high pitched voice. _'Does Decebal truly believe all of these ridiculous and absurd ideas? Even I know none of that is even the tiniest mote true!'_ Starbeam thought.

"Is Rozaniela really that saccharine and overly protective, though?" Beileag asked, looking flummoxed. "Because when I was little, kids used to pick on me, and whenever they'd do something bad, they'd tell the teachers I did it and scapegoat me. Not only that, I read an Earth manga called _Shine The Light: Loving an Autistic Child_ and that made me cry! If they really wanted to hide all traces of sadness and suffering, they'd have banned stories like-YEEEK!" Beileag explained but screamed when Decebal smacked her across the face, sending her to the floor, knocking off her heart shaped glasses.

"Keep your mouth shut! You don't have a right to question anything I say!" Decebal yelled.

"Hey! You, like, really didn't have to do that!" Beileag whined like a bratty teenager.

"She...has a point…"

Starbeam turned around, recognizing the voice. "Kyo-chan!" Despite having been electrocuted, Kyoya struggled to his feet and held onto one of the glass windows with one of his hands to keep him balanced. "I haven't...been to Rozaniela much...and I don't...know what they do…but the people and creatures...on there are nice…and kind and helpful...but you and Zenjin...killed everyone...just because of THAT?!" Kyoya hissed in a low voice at first, then screamed as loud as his voice could muster. "God, I've never seen stupider people in my life! You seriously think Starbeam's planet is all sugary and happy, and that's your justification for letting Zenjin massacre a bunch of innocent people?!"

"Yes," Decebal said bluntly.

Both Starbeam and Kyoya wished the Pretty Cure were here right now, not so much to be rescued, but so they could knock some sense into this numskull.

* * *

"Oh! What happened to your elbow, An-chan?" Saki asked with worry as she noticed the scab on Anzu's elbow from the unsuccessful fight a few minutes earlier.

"Sorry. Riko and I were playing outside when I tripped and fell. No biggie. I can take care of it," Anzu told her sheepishly as she doused it in water and soap before putting on a big band-aid. They looked away, feeling horrible about lying to her like that, but they knew they had to.

If Saki found out about the Pretty Cure-and the fact that Riko is one-she wouldn't take it well. But their hearts were now a sea of whirlpools, with the happiness sucked right out of them like a vacuum cleaner. Starbeam and Kyoya were both kidnapped, and they have no idea where they were. But they knew one thing for sure: they're in danger.

Riko and Anzu ate dinner like they wanted. Lovebeam told them to eat her share since her appetite deserted her. After they finished, they trotted up to Riko's room, where Lovebeam buried her face into her little hands. Riko screeched. "Uuuuugh! Whaddo we dooooo?! Kyo-chan and Starbeam are kidnapped and we're just sitting here! Meoooow!"

"I know. But we have to calm down and think, Riko," Anzu said.

It was here that Lovebeam pulled out her own ComLap. She opened it and pressed some buttons. Soon, an image of the queen appeared on the little screen. _"Lovebeam! How lovely it is to see you!"_ The queen's clear, pretty voice exclaimed cheerfully.

"Queen...we have a problem!" Riko suddenly exclaimed into the screen.

"_Whatever is the matter?"_

"Decebal...he took Kyo-chan and Starbeam!"

The queen gasped. _"Tell me what happened!"_ She demanded. Anzu wasted no time telling her everything. Queen Malgorzata listened intently, without interrupting.

With a grim expression, she nodded. _"I understand. Stay put. I've pinpointed your location, so I'll come to Earth to assist you right now,"_ The Queen said before signing off.

Anzu also wasted no time calling Marina and Hotaru to tell them about the Queen's arrival. Hotaru, Marina, and the other two fairies came to Riko's house as soon as they could, even though they had to sneak out. When they got to Riko's back yard, a flying horse with a horn on its head descended onto the grass, with the queen leaping off of its back, dressed in gold armor covering her Native American style garb.

Queen Malgorzata stroked the alicorn gently. "Thank you, Celestia. Good girl," The alicorn whinnied gratefully, basking in her master's praise.

"Your alicorn's name is Celestia?" Marina asked with her arms crossed.

"Yes. I think it's a fitting name for an alicorn," The Queen told her. As happy as everyone was about seeing an alicorn up close, they knew there were more important things to be attended to, their first priority being getting Starbeam and Kyoya back. Suddenly, Celestia raised her horn in the air, which glowed in a white light that spread throughout the area. It faded as quickly as it appeared.

"What just happened?" Hotaru asked.

"Celestia cast a spell that made clones of yourselvesso your families won't worry or notice your absence," The Queen explained kindly. This made Riko sigh with relief. She had been agonizing over what to do regarding that.

"This is all Lovebeam's fault!" Sunbeam suddenly shouted angrily. "If she hadn't been so reckless and stupid, Starbeam and Kyo-chan wouldn't have been kidnapped!"

"Hey! I was just trying to help!" Lovebeam argued.

"All you ever do is ruin everything and make things worse!" Sunbeam argued back.

"Calm down, you two! Shouldn't we be focusing on rescuing Starbeam and Kyo-chan?!" Moonbeam yelled as she flew in between the bickering fairies.

"Moonbeam is right. Actually, I'm not sure if you girls know, but when you were born, you had microchips implanted in you so if you ever wandered off or someone took you, we can track your location anywhere on the planet," The Queen explained.

"Huh? We got microchipped?" Moonbeam asked, confused.

And she isn't the only one. "You microchip your citizens?" Anzu asked.

"Yes, as a precautionary measure for in case anything bad happens," The Queen said as she pulled out a small machine that looks like an I-Pad. "However, since we've only used these on Rozaniela, I don't know if this will work on Earth or not, so I may have to make some adjustments, and it might take a while."

"Won't someone see you and Celestia?" Hotaru asked.

"Don't worry. Celestia?"

On cue, Celestia's horn glowed again and another circle of white light enveloped the area, fading away just as quickly. "She cast an invisibility spell on us, so nobody will see us," The Queen explained.

"Why can't you do that? Didn't your ancestors have that kind of power?" Riko asked innocently.

"Riko!" Marina scolded.

"What?!"

"It's fine. Our ancestors did have that power, but they gave all of their powers to the Energia, and that also meant their descendants-like myself-could not possess those abilities as well. The less power we had, the easier it'll be for people to get along and not lose themselves to hatred," Queen Malgorzata explained.

"Ummm…" Lovebeam began shyly. She looked reluctant to say what she wanted to, but she went and spat it out anyway. "I...I actually think we should leave Starbeam alone."

Everyone turned to look at her with faces that basically screamed, _'Do you even know what you're saying?'_ Lovebeam could tell their stares were a combination of shock and confusion, flabbergasted by what she just said. But Riko was the first to actually respond to that. "What do you mean?"

"Starbeam's actually quite strong. She's always able to get herself out of sticky situations, so I think we should let her handle this herself. I believe in her, and I think we'd just get in the way if we tried to-" Lovebeam tried to explain herself as kindly and lucidly as possible. Riko could tell there was no malice, no brattiness, no selfishness, and no callousness in her voice. Lovebeam seemed sincere and concerned. Unfortunately, a blow to her face sent her rolling into a bush.

"Sunbeam! What the heck?!" Anzu yelped.

"Why did you do that?!" Riko shouted.

"Did you really have to slap her?!" Moonbeam yelled, her silver eyes wide with bewilderment at her sister's deed. She knew Sunbeam had a bad habit of letting her anger get the better of her sometimes, but she was hardly ever violent with anyone, especially members of her own family. She only resorted to force when absolutely necessary, and if someone was being cruel or mean.

Lovebeam pulled herself out of the bushes and pulled some leaves out of her fur, only to come face to beet red face with an extremely angry Sunbeam. "How can you be so selfish, Lovebeam?! I knew it all along! You don't care about Starbeam's welfare at all! You really do have no feelings, you inconsiderate, heartless coward!" Sunbeam screamed in her highest voice, the highest she could possibly muster. Cowed by her sister's yelling, Lovebeam tried to fly away, but Sunbeam grabbed one of her ears with an iron grip and wouldn't let her go.

"Sunbeam, I don't think-" Hotaru tried to calm her down, but Sunbeam just wouldn't listen.

"Starbeam's kidnapped and you seriously just want us to sit around and not care about whether she lives or dies?!" Sunbeam screamed.

"NO! You don't understand!" Lovebeam tried to argue back, but Sunbeam wouldn't relent. Not one bit.

"No! I DO understand! You're a stupid idiot with no feelings! You only care about yourself! But that's NOT how the world works, Lovebeam! The world doesn't revolve around you! To think I thought you were better than this!"

"Sunbeam! Enough!" Queen Malgorzata shouted.

"No! She deserves to feel ashamed for once! If you weren't so selfish and immature and reckless, Starbeam wouldn't be in this mess right now!" Sunbeam completely ignored her.

"I'm NOT selfish! I just-"

"YES YOU ARE! Why can't you admit it for once?!"

"You don't understand!" Lovebeam shouted, appalled by Sunbeam absolutely refusing to listen to what she has to say. Riko started moaning at this point, her eyes wide with unadulterated fright.

"I understand plenty! I get that you couldn't care less about your own sister and the fact that she's probably knocking on death's doors! Better yet, you don't even care about Mom or Dad! You just wanted to stay on Earth so you could play dress up and play pwetty pwetty pwincesses! Why'd you even come to Earth anyway?! It can't be because you genuinely wanted to find the Pretty Cure and help Rozaniela! You probably just wanted to see what Earth's fashions are like! You never think about us at all! You never do!"

"Don't you DARE say that!" Lovebeam finally protested. "I'd die for all of you! For everyone I love!"

"You just said you wanted to leave Starbeam all alone!"

"Actually, no she didn't. She said-" Riko tried to interject, but Sunbeam cut her off.

"Be quiet!"

"Why don't you understand?!"

"I UNDERSTAND PLENTY, YOU DUMMY!"

"Alright! That! Is! ENOUGH!" Riko screamed as she bonked the two of them on their heads, finally stopping them from arguing, even though Sunbeam really wanted to do some more. Her anger refused to simmer down.

But instead of being angry, Lovebeam's purple eyes watered to the point where tears started pouring out of her eyes like waterfalls. She saw absolutely nothing. Her pudgy face was completely contorted, broken by Sunbeam's tirade. Sunbeam stomped on her heart and ground the pieces into the dirt with her yelling and complete insensitivity. She didn't even bother to just sit down and listen. Lovebeam wondered if this was what Sunbeam felt when Zenjin broke her heart.

"WHY CAN'T YOU EVER LISTEN TO ME FOR OOOOONCE?!" Lovebeam shouted before the light on her bow clip glowed in a pink light. Then she disappeared into thin air.

"Hmph! It's just like her to run away like a coward!" Sunbeam hissed with her arms crossed.

"Sunbeam! I think you misunderstood what she was trying to say," Riko proclaimed.

"What was there to misunderstand?! She said she wants to leave Starbeam with Decebal!" Sunbeam argued, her anger unceasing. Riko kept her ears covered, but she continued on.

"No she didn't. She said Starbeam is able to get out of situations like this, and that we shouldn't doubt her abilities," Riko told her.

"Where did she go anyway?" Marina asked.

"Probably to Rozaniela," Hotaru suggested.

"The clips on their bows also serve as teleportation devices, and they can travel back and forth from Earth to Rozaniela individually," The Queen explained.

Moonbeam's ears twitched as a realization sprouted in her mind like a newly blossoming plant. "I think she probably went to our house," Moonbeam suggested.

Riko balled her fists and approached the queen. Moonbeam did the same. "Queen. Would it be okay if we went to Rozaniela to talk to her?" Riko asked.

"I can take her there myself. We'll try not to be too long," Moonbeam suggested with concern in her sweet voice.

"Just leave her alone! She needs to stop being a spoiled brat anyway!" Sunbeam yelled.

"Sunbeam! Just stop, okay?! Instead of picking fights and acting like you know her, why don't you try being her sister and listening to her for once?!" Moonbeam yelled, having finally had enough of Sunbeam's insensitivity and lack of concern for her sister. Sunbeam was so cowed by her youngest sister's scolding that she finally zipped her mouth shut. Was this really Moonbeam? "She isn't what you think she is!"

"Alright. You two can go. We'll let you know when we've tracked Starbeam and Kyoya," The Queen told her.

"Thank you, your majesty," Riko said with a bow. She and Moonbeam held hands as the crescent moon shaped clip on her ribbon glowed in a purple light, teleporting them off of Earth.

* * *

Unfortunately for the Pretty Cure, Decebal finally got to electrocute Starbeam. "Stop! Leave her alone!" Kyoya yelled, but the sullen, green haired man refused to listen. Soon, he finished and Starbeam fell in the boy's hands, charred and gasping for breath. Kyoya glared at the green haired man without any mercy. "You don't have to go this far!"

"Yes I do! Anything that'll make these fools understand what suffering is!" Beileag took a few steps back, cowed by Decebal's anger.

'_I've never seen Decebal so passionate and angry before. He's scaring me. The boy's right. He really doesn't have to go this far. Is this why he was so serious about helping Zenjin get the Energia?'_ Beileag thought, feeling herself shiver.

"I think a lot of people know what suffering is!" Kyoya protested.

"Really? Tell me, boy. What do you define as hardship? Knowing your legs will never work? Parents divorcing? High school drama? Boyfriend stealing? Those are all petty compared to-" A blue ray of light shot at him, knocking him against the far side of the wall.

"Decebal!" Beileag was about to help until she got hit by a ray of light also, heading in the same direction. Kyoya couldn't believe it. Even after Starbeam got electrocuted and tortured for the sake of proving a point, she managed to still have enough energy to fire some beams at them.

"Come on, Kyo-chan!" Starbeam implored as she tugged on Kyoya's shirt. "We have to get out of here!"

"But I can't walk! Remember?!"

"I can help with that!" Starbeam suddenly turned into a light that flew onto Kyoya's back, stuck to him, and morphed into a cape.

"What are you-?!" Before Kyoya could ask, he found himself flying in the air, his feet no longer touching the ground. With a scream, he found himself flying out of the warehouse in a sea of confusion. But there was one thing he was happy about: the fact that they were escaping. But he wished that whatever Starbeam was doing, they'd slow down a bit.

"Calm yourself, Kyo-chan! I'm getting us out of here! That's why you're flying right now!" Starbeam explained.

"So you turned into a cape?!"

"Yes!"

"I thought you couldn't shapeshift!"

"We can only change into certain things! But now's not the time for that right now!"

"We don't even know if we're in the same neighborhood or not!"

"I'll get us back home! Just stay calm and let me figure things out! I won't let them catch us!"

"Wha!"

All of a sudden, flashes of blue lightning shot at them, even though they managed to evade them. Kyoya turned around with a gasp. Decebal and Beileag were flying after them in hot pursuit.

"You won't get away, you little brats!" Decebal yelled as he fired more thunderbolts at them.

"They must want to use us as a means to lure everyone out here so they can attack them!" Starbeam exclaimed.

"They're gonna come and save us anyway, so why bother?" Kyoya asked.

"Maybe we know too much," Starbeam said. Even so, they kept flying through the sky as fast a speed as Starbeam could muster.

* * *

Riko and Moonbeam descended onto Rozaniela. Riko didn't recognize the area she was in, but Moonbeam certainly did. the purple fairy froze when she saw the remains of their once prosperous and happy neighborhood. Instead of seeing nice fairy houses with lots of trees, a street, sidewalks, and kids or fairies playing games, all they saw are piles of debris, trees stripped bare of their leaves, and not a single soul in sight.

"Is this your neighborhood, Moonbeam?" Riko asked softly. Moonbeam nodded grimly.

"My house is near here. It's just a big pile of debris now," Moonbeam muttered as she floated away. Riko followed her. They turned one corner to find yet another pile of debris, like everything else in the neighborhood.

Instead, they saw something different. An actual house, that actually looked like it was being worked on. It was standing tall and strong, with lots of wallpaper on the front of it, with some ladders on the side. There were a few roof tiles on it, but it wasn't finished yet. Moonbeam was frozen with awe and surprise. She saw her house become a pile of debris. She thought it would stay that way. She didn't expect it to be steadily worked on. She didn't expect someone would come and rebuild it for them.

"Mom must be...working on a new house for us…" Moonbeam murmured softly, but some joy peppered her sweet voice. Riko couldn't help but smile. "This must be why...the queen didn't want us to return at first…"

"Let's see if Lovebeam's inside," Riko told her gently. Moonbeam nodded and they went inside. Like the exterior of the house, the interior wasn't quite finished yet. The walls were covered but not painted. The ceiling needed to be covered, as pipes-probably newly installed-traveled all over it. There wasn't any trace of furniture in here. No couches, no sofas, no TV, no tables, no toys, nothing. But it had that fresh fragrance that only belonged to new houses.

However, there was one thing sitting in the house that looked like a plush toy but wasn't. Riko walked up to the pink fairy and kneeled to her level. She could see Lovebeam's dejected expression, the tears shining on her pudgy face.

"Mom's great. She's building a new house for us. She and the workers are probably on break…" Lovebeam murmured.

"That's good. You'll get to live here again," Riko said.

"Sunbeam's right. I am a coward. And selfish. And inconsiderate," A tear trickled down one of her cheeks.

"I don't think you are."

Lovebeam looked up at her with swollen eyes full of curiosity, confused by Riko's kindness and her soft tone of voice. "You don't?"

"No. If you really were selfish and inconsiderate, you wouldn't have taken care of Sunbeam while she was sick. You wouldn't have socked Zenjin in the face earlier today and that other time, when Fukiko-chan got attacked."

"He deserved it for hurting Sunbeam the way he did."

"If someone was mean to my little sister, I'd sock them in the face, too. That shows you care. Everyone's selfish at times, even me. But I know you're not heartless, and I know you have feelings."

"I...I do care about people. I try to help out whenever I can. But...they don't like it," Lovebeam began sadly, her voice trembling. "I'm the oldest in my family. When my sisters were born, I wanted to help them with everything and be there for them and take care of them, like any big sister would. Sure, I wouldn't have time to do what I like, but I knew better. But...when they got older, they didn't like it when I tried to help them."

(flashback)

_A young Lovebeam flew around the house and stopped in the living room when she saw her younger sister, Sunbeam, trying to carry a plate of cookies over her head. The cookie sheet looked bigger than she could handle, and Sunbeam was clearly struggling to keep it balanced. Thankfully, no cookies fell out. Lovebeam floated over to her and very slowly put herself underneath one side of the cookie sheet._

"_I'll help you!" Lovebeam said as she put her hands on the bottom of the metal cookie sheet to ease the burden on Sunbeam._

"_You don't need to. I can do it myself," Sunbeam told her._

"_But this thing's too big for you! The cookies'll fall!" Lovebeam protested._

"_It's fine! I need to learn how to do this stuff myself!" Sunbeam argued. But she accidentally took a hand off the cookie sheet, and all of a sudden, some cookies began sliding off. Sunbeam tried to get them, but they fell on the hard floor. Lovebeam managed to balance the cookie sheet and put it on a little table in the living room, but to everyone's shock, they only managed to save four cookies. The rest of them mushed onto the floor, unable to be consumed. Sunbeam was livid._

"_You ruined it, you dummy! I could have done it just fine by myself!" Sunbeam yelled._

"_No I didn't! You took your hand off the sheet! I was just trying to help!" Lovebeam protested, understandably hurt by Sunbeam's accusation._

_Another time, Lovebeam found Starbeam sitting in her room, looking over a worksheet, probably for school. She sweetly walked into the room. "Do you need help studying? I can help. I'm good at studying for tests."_

"_I appreciate your generosity, but I opine that this test shan't be difficult to pass with flying colors. But thanks for your offer. I'll be alright," Starbeam said without taking her eyes off of her paper._

"_Wow. You sure know a lot of big words," Lovebeam said and left the room. She was happy that Starbeam was so confident in her studying. But she wished she could have helped her out a little bit._

_There was another time when Lovebeam saw Starbeam being surrounded by some fairies, who had mean faces on them. _'Those meanies! They're gonna bully her again! Nobody picks on my baby sister! Not on my watch!'_ Lovebeam thought as she was about to go and give those nasty bullies a good spanking. However, before she could fly in and do anything, the fairies suddenly flew away just as quickly, leaving behind a smiling Starbeam._

"_What did you do just now?" Lovebeam asked when she approached her younger sister._

"_Salutations, Lovebeam. Those boys are up to their old machinations again. Thankfully, I managed to not only escape their clutches, but drive them crazy with my sesquipedalian loquaciousness. It was great fun," Starbeam explained with a chuckle._

"_I could have kicked their butts so they'd leave you alone," Lovebeam said._

"_I know, but I don't want you to be punished. Also, I have to learn how to fight my own battles and stand on my own two feet. I appreciate your help, but I can't be relying on everyone and using them as crutches forever. Oh! How about we have lunch. Sunbeam's learning how to make cinnamon rolls," Starbeam explained._

_Instead of feeling rejected like she expected, admiration creeped into her heart. She couldn't believe Starbeam was growing up this fast, learning how to fight her own battles and stand up to bullies by using her addiction to big words to her advantage. However, as much as Lovebeam lauded her sister for using her talent to avoid trouble, she wished she could have helped her out._

(end flashback)

"I've seen Starbeam drive bullies crazy with her talk, and when they didn't relent, she always found a way out. She took some judo classes and I've seen her take on some especially mean fairies. I really admired her for that, so I started believing that she really could take care of herself in situations like that. I wasn't saying we should let Decebal hurt her or that we should leave her there. I...I want to believe in her. She's smart and strong. I wanted to believe in her and not get in her way like I usually did," Lovebeam said sadly.

Riko stroke one of her long ears with her fingers. Moonbeam listened intently. She never saw this side of Lovebeam before. After hearing all of this, she was further convinced that Lovebeam was most definitely not heartless or inconsiderate. She was considerate enough to let her sisters grow up and learn to handle themselves when needed.

But that didn't mean Lovebeam didn't help them when they did needed it. Sunbeam got sick because of the stress of leaving home, but Lovebeam stayed by her side and did whatever she could to help her get better.

Moonbeam remembered a time when she tried to fly but kept falling and hurting herself, bawling in her failure. But Lovebeam always showed her how to do it, and encouraged her to keep trying. "Don't give up, Moonbeam! You can do it! It takes lots of practice! Try again!" Lovebeam never stopped cheering her on and comforting her when she fell. She never demeaned her for not being able to get it right off. In the end, Moonbeam managed to fly without falling. The joy both she and Lovebeam felt that day couldn't be contained, and they cheered and rejoiced happily.

There was also the time when Moonbeam spilled juice on the rug and Lovebeam willingly-and without complaint-took the blame for it, the times when Lovebeam helped her with her homework, when she got a really nice birthday present from Sunbeam-who accepted it happily, when she helped Moonbeam buy a good birthday present for their father, all those happy memories they shared together.

"I know I shouldn't baby my sisters and get in their way-which I admit I usually do, and don't mean to-but...nobody helps me when I need it most of the time. When I'm sad, I can't tell my sisters about it because they either don't listen or say it's my fault and that I should get over it," Lovebeam confessed.

"I know how you feel," Riko told her.

"I don't think that, and I never tell you to get over it," Moonbeam told her reassuringly, with a twinge of sadness peppering her voice.

"I know you don't, Moonbeam. You always comfort me when I'm sad, even when I did do something bad. You don't yell or make a big deal about it like Sunbeam always does, and you always listen and don't jump to conclusions," Lovebeam told her gratefully but still sadly. "But...Sunbeam and Starbeam...and everyone else...they all expect me to be perfect. They all expect me to be able to solve my own problems and ignore me when I need their help! When I try to tell anyone anything, especially Sunbeam, they ignore me and don't listen!"

This is where she started crying for real, and rather loudly. She turned to Riko, flew into her arms, and vented all of her frustrations. She talked about how she felt everyone always wanted her to have all the answers to everything, be considerate, and help others, but how she felt they never helped her when she needed it. She always felt ignored and treated like she didn't matter and that everything she said was interpreted as bad. She said she began acting like a brat so people could notice that she was sad or angry. Lovebeam felt as though she couldn't be selfish or tell people how she felt, and the stress of both caring for her sisters, leaving home, Zenjin's genocide, and the feelings she kept bottled up was too much for her to handle. She couldn't take it anymore. She wished someone would care about her for once.

Lovebeam cried into Riko's shirt, bawling and leaving big tear marks all over it. All Riko did was stroke her heart covered back as she cried, hoping her gesture would tell Lovebeam that she cared, that she was listening, that her cries were being heard. Lovebeam felt the warmth in Riko's hands stroking her fur. Not only that, she felt like a huge pile of bricks finally got lifted off of her. She no longer felt weighed down by everyone's expectations or maligned accusations.

Moonbeam's ears drooped down dejectedly. How could she not have known any of this about her big sister? How could she not have known Lovebeam was this insecure, that she really felt like she was inadequate or not worth it, in her own family, that she felt like she had to keep smiling and keep everyone together because she's the big sister and endure everything because that's what everyone expected of her? Moonbeam never tried to expect these things out of her. Sure, she did rely on her for some things, but she never did it to make Lovebeam sad or angry.

"You've been holding it all in all this time, haven't you?" Riko whispered softly.

"I didn't tell anyone. I was afraid they'd tell me to get over it, like Sunbeam does. That's one of the reasons why I didn't want to come to Rozaniela back when the dimensions finally paralleled. I didn't want to be a burden to Mom and Dad...and I was afraid they'd tell me I'm a bad sister," Lovebeam said, softer this time. The tears didn't stop.

"I don't know your parents, but I don't think they'd say that. I think they'd be happy that you and everyone else are at least alright. They're probably worrying themselves sick over you, and...I can actually relate to you in a way," Riko told her.

Lovebeam looked up with surprise, her lavendar eyes curious. "How so?"

Riko told Lovebeam about her own autism, her eccentric behavior, and some of her own experiences at a school she went to in Yokosuka, such as how a teacher was cruel to her for no reason and how kids at another school claimed she didn't have any feelings. "I don't mean to make people embarrassed or cause any trouble, but it just happens, and people think I'm a bad person and don't listen."

"I never knew that. Sorry for all the mean things I said about you, and you definitely have feelings! If you didn't, you wouldn't be comforting me like this!"

"It's alright. I kinda deserve it. I am pretty stupid and dumb. I want to love Rina, but she hates me and is convinced I'm the worst thing that ever happened to her. Sometimes, I wish I had been born a cat or lived in Moominvalley, where everyone's happy and nice and are never mean to anyone because of how they look or act."

Moonbeam's ears twitched. Realizations hit her like a freight train. Riko acts like a cat because she wishes she could be one instead of an autistic girl? True, Moonbeam was only just learning about Riko's Autism now (she made a mental note to study it when this whole brouhaha is over), but a lot of things Riko said were starting to make a lot of sense now.

"You're not stupid!" Moonbeam suddenly exclaimed. "If you were, you wouldn't get good grades on your homework! If you really were stupid, you wouldn't be nice to everyone, and that's what I like about you! You're nice and you care about your loved ones, and that's what matters!"

"That's true," Lovebeam agreed.

"I don't even like school. I only study hard because I have to," Riko said. "But anyway...I don't think you're a brat, Lovebeam. True, you are really whiny and selfish, but I know you have feelings and care."

"I do too!" Moonbeam piped in. "But...there are things even we can't handle and we get sad too. Sunbeam couldn't get through to Zenjin and he really hurt her. I wish I could have seen all of this coming and had been able to stop it in some way. Plus...I know you think you'll only get in Starbeam's way and ruin everything, but...I think you'll regret it if you're...not there for her now," Moonbeam told her kindly, putting a small purple hand on Lovebeam's pink one.

Lovebeam looked down sadly. Moonbeam had a good point. Starbeam faced school bullies before, and they hardly had any powers. But they were up against Zenjin, who, at this point in time, has powers he really shouldn't have. He can do anything from freeze time to completely destroy an entire universe with the Energia in his bloodstream. The fairies and the queen have seen the extent of Zenjin's transgressions. With their own eyes. There was no way Starbeam or Kyoya could possibly be able to stand even the tiniest millimeter of a chance against him, Kyoya even more so since he can't walk, and running was especially impossible for him. Starbeam would definitely put her life on the line for him, like she would everyone else, but she could die. They both could. If she and the Pretty Cure weren't there for him now...Lovebeam looked into Riko's eyes.

"Let's go. Starbeam and Kyo-chan need us," She told her softly, but with a twinge of courage in her voice and warmth in her lavender eyes. Riko nodded with a smile. Moonbeam did the same.

All of a sudden, the ComLap appeared in front of Moonbeam, and the image of Queen Malgorzata appeared on the green. _"Girls. I've managed to pinpoint Starbeam's location. Come back to Earth at once!"_

"We'll be there in a bit!" Riko told her.

"Catch you on the rebound!" Lovebeam piped in with her usual sweet smile. Moonbeam smiled, feeling a sense of relief overtake her. Talking to Riko had certainly helped Lovebeam quite a lot. She knew she wasn't so bratty after all.

* * *

"Are we in Hikaribashi yet?!" Kyoya yelped, still being dragged in the sky by Starbeam.

"I don't know! I don't recognize any of these buildings!" Starbeam told him. "But it looks like we've managed to shake off Decebal and Beileag. Oh! I see a forest down there!"

Starbeam finally slowed down as she and Kyoya descended into an ocean of trees in some town far away from Hikaribashi. It was next to an open meadow, but the leaves on the trees were definitely bushy and thick enough to hide a little boy and a blue teddy bear-like creature from anyone's view.

They descended in front of a particularly big oak tree, prompting Starbeam to return to her original form. The trees were so thick, they practically blocked all sunlight, leaving only a few sunny spots dancing on the dirt beneath their feet. Kyoya leaned against a tree while sitting down as he watched Starbeam pant like she ran a marathon. Sweat beaded her pale blue face. Some of it trickled down her cheeks and dripped onto the dirt, leaving dark marks.

"A bit of a bumpy ride, but thanks for saving me back there," Kyoya told her with a smile as he adjusted his glasses to fit on his face better.

"You're very welcome. I could very well say the same to you, since you took Decebal's lightning attack for me earlier," Starbeam told him gratefully, but the red haired boy could see that her eyes were an ocean of worry and concern. He did like that they were the same color as his own eyes. "However...why did you do that? He could have killed you. I know for a fact that people who have been struck by lightning are very likely to perish."

"Did you really expect me to just sit there and let him torture you? No way! I'd let myself be paralyzed forever or swim in a sea of fire than let anyone hurt you or anyone else I love! Besides, you never did anything bad to him!" Kyoya balled one of his fists and held it to his chest, emphasizing that he means what he says.

Starbeam looked down at the splotchy dirt beneath her stubby little feet. She couldn't believe how courageous and brave Kyoya was. He put his life on the line for her sake, and would likely do it again. She admired him and his courage, but even she knew it wouldn't be enough to save them both. Starbeam pulled her ComLap out of her star shaped bow clip and began tinkering with it.

All of a sudden, Moonbeam's face appeared on the little screen. _"Starbeam! Is that you?! You're okay!"_

"Yes, little sister! Kyo-chan and I are alright. I don't have any knowledge of the area we're in right now, but we managed to escape Decebal and Beileag's clutches as of right now. It probably won't last, as they're searching for us."

"_Just stay put! We know where you are, and we're not too far from it right now, so we'll be there as soon as we can! Whatever happens, be safe, okay?"_ Moonbeam told her.

"Alright. You do the same," Starbeam told her before closing the ComLap and putting it back in her star shaped bow clip.

"I knew they'd find us," Kyoya said with a smile. Starbeam could tell that he had faith in them the whole time, and it never wavered.

But all of a sudden, purple appendages popped out of the ground and coiled around Kyoya like a big python trying to eat him! He struggled to his feet and tried to get away, but he tripped and fell face down on the ground. His glasses bounced off of his face.

"Kyo-chan!" Starbeam tried to fly to his aid but some purple appendages coiled around her as well.

"Got'cha, my pretties!" Beileag's high pitched voice exclaimed from a few feet away from them. Starbeam looked up to find one of Beileag's hands glowing in an indigo light, with Decebal coming up behind her with a victorious smirk on his face.

"Good work, Billie. We have the rats in our clutches at last," Decebal told her.

Beileag blushed and squealed happily, like she was asked to go on a date with a cute boy. "You're embarrassing me, Decebal! But thank you!"

Kyoya rolled his eyes, blurry as they are without his glasses. _'She's probably got a major crush on that guy,'_ Kyoya thought before shouting, "Let us go!"

"Absolutely not! You know too much, and you make a great lure for the Pretty Cure," Decebal told him condescendingly.

"Hey! That rhymed!" Beileag exclaimed with a sweet, ditzy smile.

"I really don't see how knowing that you want to destroy a planet because you think it's all sugary and sweet counts as knowing too much. It's not even that good of a motivation to take over the world!" Kyoya retorted boldly. "Besides, Earth is kind of like that too! People are always complaining about violent video games and comic books and anime, believing that they corrupt people and teach them bad things and even make them kill people! But they don't go around killing people to get their point across. If they did, it'd make them look bad, and it'd completely go against everything they're fighting for!"

"He does have a point," Beileag piped in, which made a vein pop in Decebal's head.

"Rozaniela isn't the planet you think it is, Decebal. You didn't have to go to such extremes. All of this could have been avoided if you had just discussed your concerns with the King or Queen-" Starbeam reasoned, but he suddenly unsheathed his rapier and pointed it at the blue fairy.

"I DID THAT ALREADY! But that naive, spineless fool Ghislain kicked me out of the royal guard for even bringing up the subject with him! The fact that he kicked me out confirms that he and everyone else on this planet don't stand for anyone going against the status quo! To them, suffering and misery have no place on Rozaniela, and everything just HAS to be nice and happy so everyone can be _'protected!'_ Sometimes, extremes HAVE to be taken in order for people to finally get the message!" Decebal bellowed like a ferocious animal, his cherry red eyes wide with hatred. Even Kyoya couldn't look him in the eye. "I honestly want to kill you both right now for being so stupid and naive to think there is no suffering and misery in this world. Someone has to make you suffer to understand the real world. Why not me or Zenjin?" Decebal pulled up his rapier, looking ready to slice them into little tiny pieces.

"Over my dead body!" All of a sudden, a pink tornado rammed into Decebal's hand, knocking the rapier right out of his hand, sending it rolling on the dirt.

The pink tornado then descended in front of Kyoya and Starbeam, revealing itself to be Lovebeam. "You're dead if you lay so much as a hand on my friend and baby sister!"

Out of nowhere, the Pretty Cure, Sunbeam, Moonbeam, Queen Malgorzata, and her alicorn Celestia all descended before a bewildered and flabbergasted Decebal and Beileag, their eyes wide with shock. Kyoya and Starbeam's eyes, however, were wide with relief and overwhelming joy.

"You made it!" Kyoya exclaimed. Cure Twilight got her claws out and cut the purple appendages wrapping them.

"Sorry we took so long. You're not hurt are you?" Cure Twilight asked with concern as she escorted Kyoya to Celestia.

"A little fried on the inside, but I'm good," Kyoya said as Celestia used her psychic powers to put him on her back.

"Celestia. Take Kyo-chan home for us. Okay?" Cure Twilight said. Celestia nodded before spreading her wings and flying away with Kyoya on her back.

"You've got some nerve showing up here, Queen!" Decebal yelled as he grabbed his rapier. The Queen drew out a golden trident and pointed it to the defiant green haired man without any mercy or pity in her eyes.

"Zenjin may be responsible for the massacre of many of my beloved subjects, but to think you stole the Energia for him and set everything in motion! It pains me to fight you, but don't think I'll show you any mercy!" The Queen edicted in a booming voice. But it didn't scare him, as Decebal suddenly flew out of the forest and into the meadow, followed by Beileag.

"GET HIM!" Cure Dawn shouted, drawing out her nunchucks. On her command, everyone flew into the meadow to fight Decebal and Beileag.

Cure Starlight was the first to make her move on Decebal, using her naginata to clash with Decebal's rapier to distract him so Cure Dawn could land a good punch to the face. It sent him flying to the ground, and before he could get back up, he found Cure Twilight about to unleash a Twilight Serenade on him. He would have been creamed if Beileag hadn't set up an indigo colored dome-shaped shield to protect him. When the shield faded, the Queen tried to stab him with her trident, but Decebal managed to intercept it with her rapier. But he found that he's being pushed back quite a bit. _'The Queen sure is strong. But a stupid woman like her is better of licking the feet of that fool she's married to,'_ Decebal thought.

"You must repent for your crimes!" Malgorzata exclaimed.

"I don't need to repent anything!" Decebal yelled back as he pushed the trident away and flew to another part of the meadow. Cure Dusk tried to land some punches on him, but with a swift kick to the abdomen, he sent her flying against a tree.

"Dusk!" Cure Twilight flew to her aid, accompanied by Moonbeam and Starbeam.

"Starlight Shower!" Cure Starlight commanded a rain of stars to fall from the sky. They seemed like they hit Decebal until the dust cloud revealed that the green haired man set up a barrier around himself with a smug smirk on his face. When it dissipated, he flew toward Cure Starlight to maim her with his rapier, but she grabbed the sword with her two hands, preventing it from leaving a scratch on her. But she had to admit, Decebal is quite strong, and she can't hold the sword forever.

"Starlight!" Sunbeam and Lovebeam managed to ram themselves into Decebal enough for him to be distracted enough for the blue cure to land a kick and a punch on him. But this didn't deter him one bit. He smacked the fairies away like they were flies. Cure Twilight managed to catch them in the nick of time. She tried to fly away, but Beileag appeared in front of the bewildered purple cure.

"It's very rude to run away from a special occasion, little girl!" Beileag chirped in a sickeningly sweet voice as she snapped her fingers and made purple ropes clamp around the purple cure, sending her to the ground with Lovebeam and Sunbeam squeezed in her arms.

"Golden Dawn Explosion!" Cure Dawn slammed her nunchucks on the ground, making a huge ball of light consume the meadow. It sent Beileag flying far beyond the forest. Not only that, the purple appendages around Cure Twilight dissipated into thin air, freeing her. Cure Dawn hopped to her and helped her up.

"Thanks," Cure Twilight told her gratefully.

"Don't mention it," Cure Dawn said.

"Mandarin Dusk Inferno!" Cure Dusk unleashed a tornado of fire on Decebal. The fiery twister consumed him. "I got him!" Cure Dusk exclaimed with a smile, thinking they had the upper hand.

Unfortunately for her, the fiery tornado suddenly perished as Decebal unleashed a black explosion of energy, sending her and other cures, including the Queen, across the meadow. But the Queen was quick to get back on her feet and charge at the callous green haired man with her shimmering golden trident in hand.

"Don't be so cocky, Queen!" Decebal got his rapier out again, but before he could do anything, she swipes his rapier out of his hands with her trident, sending it rolling on the grass. She then puts her trident away, grabs Decebal by the shirt, and lands a very harsh punch to the face, sending him flying into a nearby tree. Decebal struggled to get on his feet, but felt something warm on his face. He could see red droplets marking his beautiful Shakespearian garb. Just seeing the red liquid made his cherry red eyes wide with bloodlust. "You DARE sully my beautiful face, you rotten, two faced witch!"

The Queen drew out her trident once again. "Turn yourself in, Decebal! It is your duty!" Queen Malgorzata demanded audaciously in a strong, booming voice, fitting for a warrior in battle.

Decebal could tell by her wicked battle stance, the steady way she held her trident, the fierce, courageous glint in her eyes, and the booming tone of voice that she is in no mood for letting him get away with his crimes. Not that he cared, nor was willing to concede defeat like she wanted. Soon, the Pretty Cure and the fairies surrounded him with their weapons ready to give him a piece of their minds.

"Ready for our finisher, girls?" Cure Twilight edicted like a leader. The girls nodded and proceeded with their final attack.

"Lend us your strength, holy light! Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!" The light that made the meadow flash consumed Decebal. For a moment, they thought he was defeated...until a black light suddenly pierced through their light, blowing everyone to different parts of the meadow.

They froze in horror to find Decebal's eyes filled to the brim with bloodlust. Before they could do anything else to him, the purple appendages wrapped around everyone, including the fairies, and they found their bodies jolting from the inside out with blue electricity. They felt like their bodies were being burned inside and out, and they all screamed in excruciating pain.

"Yes! Scream! This is what suffering is, you sheltered cave rats! This tells me who you all are!" Decebal screamed, his mouth wider than he thought it could be. Absolute sociopathic glee danced in his blood lust filled eyes. He wished Zenjin was here to see this.

But what he didn't know is that the coils around the Queen suddenly dissipated via being cut with a small Swiss Army knife. Not only that, Cure Twilight freed herself as well with her cat claws. The two of them-side by side, with matching green eyes blazing with courage-charged at Decebal and landed massive punches to the abdomen, rendering him unable to breath. So much so that the coils around the girls and fairies vanished, and they were free from the electric torture.

However, Decebal recovered quickly and tried to slash the Queen with his rapier, but the silver haired woman and the purple cure both intercepted it with the trident and claws. The two girls pushed with all their might, hoping to get through him. Finally, with a booming yell, they both managed to push past Decebal and launch flurries of kicks and punches on the man.

"This is for everyone on Rozaniela!" The Queen yelled as she took Decebal by his fluffy collar and threw him onto another part of the meadow. But before she could detain him, a purple ball of energy suddenly hit the area between her and Decebal. The fairies scattered around her and formed a shield around their queen so she wouldn't get hurt.

"Don't hurt him!"

When the queen opened her eyes, she found Beileag standing in front of a very irritated and battered Decebal, who still managed to get back on his feet in spite of everything the Queen and the Pretty Cures did to him. He didn't seem happy when Beileag intervened just now. "Get out of my way!"

"Please! Don't hurt him anymore!" Beileag pleaded with her arms stretched out like she was shielding Decebal from any further attacks.

The fairies brought down their shield. The Queen remained as composed as she always was. "Billie, dear. I thought you were better than this. You played a part in their machinations, too?"

Beileag didn't say anything. Her eyes-hidden behind her tinted, heart shaped glasses-trembled in the presence of the royalty in front of her. But she didn't dare move from where she was. "Why, Billie? Why are you helping them? You have no reason to do any of this. You're not like Decebal. But why? I want to know! You have a bright future ahead of you! Don't throw it away!" The Queen pleaded sadly.

Riko could hear the Queen's normally composed and regal voice breaking with worry and sorrow. Even Beileag had a sad look on her face, like she really wanted to run to the Queen and defect to her. But the indigo haired hippie remained in place.

"I...I agree that Decebal's going too far. But...I...I love him…" Beileag muttered. But before she could say anything more, Decebal stood up and smacked her across the face so hard that she fell to the floor.

"You're in my way, you idiot!" Decebal roared before drawing out his rapier again.

The angry glint returned to the Queen's eyes. "You can do better than this, Beileag! Look how he treats you! Do you really want to spend the rest of your life being his punching bag?!" The Queen demanded angrily.

"He's only angry because you won't listen to him!" Beileag answered as she struggled to get back on her high heeled feet.

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Cure Dusk fired a flaming arrow at him, which he caught with his gloved hand and crushed like it was a piece of paper. The flames dissipated and they didn't even leave any marks on his perfectly white gloves.

"Stupid little pests," Decebal muttered.

"I should never have left raising Zenjin to you had I known this was what you had planned!" The Queen roared as she clutched her trident. "Do you even understand the gravity of your crimes?!"

"Yes, we do. But do we look like we care? Rozaniela deserves to be a barren wasteland! Your people deserve to know what it's like to suffer and be miserable! Now if you'll excuse us, we have an objective to fulfill, and you'd best stay out of our way! You stand no chance against Zenjin and us!" Decebal bellowed as he snapped his fingers before teleporting away with Beileag at his side.

However, a huge army of black Transparent appeared and began surrounding the girls. But they didn't get to do anything, as the Queen took her trident and maimed every single black blob, slicing them all into thin air without grunting or complaining. The girls gasped at the Queen curb stomping every single one of those black blobs. They heard that she was powerful and skilled, but their jaws dropped when they fixated their eyes on Malgorzata managing to knock out nearly every single Transparent with just her trident.

When the Queen maimed the final transparent, Cure Twilight fell to her knees in exhaustion, panting from the intense battle. Celestia returned and descended onto the meadow, with her beautiful, long rainbow mane shimmering in the orange light of the sunset, her pearl horn shining like it rested beneath the sea. Starbeam suddenly flew to Lovebeam and trapped her in a hug. Moonbeam did the same. "I'm so glad you're okay, Starbeam!" Lovebeam squealed happily.

"I am ever so grateful you came to my rescue," Starbeam chirped gratefully and nuzzled her older sister, who giggled sweetly, basking in her little sister's gratitude and relief. Lovebeam herself was drowning in a tsunami of relief, happy that Starbeam was safe and sound. She was so sad she wanted to die before, but now she didn't want to so much as trade places with an angel. Then, the three sisters stopped when Sunbeam approached them, with a guarded but remorseful expression on her chubby orange face.

"Lovebeam...I'm sorry for the mean things I said about you. Moonbeam told me everything when we came to rescue Starbeam," Sunbeam told her softly but still keeping a twinge of caution in her voice.

"Oh? Did you two have a disagreement yet again?" Starbeam asked innocently, curious as to what their fight was about.

"Yes, and it's okay. I kind of deserved it," Lovebeam said. "But you're wrong in that I don't have any feelings or that I don't care what happens to my family. I do care."

"It's true. If she really didn't care, she wouldn't have helped us out just now," Moonbeam said.

"I get it. But you're really going to have to work on that bratty attitude of yours. Don't think I'm gonna let you off easy for what you said about Starbeam," Sunbeam said before flying toward Marina.

"What DID you say about me, Lovebeam?" Starbeam asked. Lovebeam and Moonbeam explained everything to the blue fairy. "I understand. I know you weren't trying to be rude or mean. But there are things even I can't do, and I do need help sometimes. If I wanted help, I'd definitely ask."

Lovebeam found herself blubbering before she squeezed Starbeam yet again. "I'm so sorry, little sister! I'm sorry I'm such a bad big sister!" Lovebeam blubbered like a baby. Starbeam simply stroke her sister's heart covered back with her paw.

"You're not a bad big sister. You came for me after all. That's what sisters do. Thank you for being there," Starbeam told her. When Lovebeam finally finished blubbering, the girls-tired and exhausted from that grueling battle, hopped onto Celestia's back as the beautiful alicorn flew them all home before taking the Queen back to Rozaniela.

* * *

**Author's Note: I trimmed down some long paragraphs, rewrote others from scratch, and changed some words around. Chapter 19 is going to be completely rewritten so I can try and address some things. I hope this helps.**


	19. Bonus: Princess Kaguya was a Cat

Twilight Pretty Cure, Bonus Chapter

Riko Chapter: Princess Kaguya was a Cat.

You really don't get what the big deal is about being normal. What's so good about normal, you ask yourself. You don't like that people your age start cursing, using bad words, wearing those ridiculously short skirts, wearing their pants so low you can see their entire underwear (yuck!), talking endlessly about boys and other icky stuff she overhears but doesn't want to think about. You wonder if there's some kind of secret underground club they go to where they learn all this so-called normal stuff: how to dress, what to say, what words are cool, what shows you can and can't watch, etc.

You think this because you really don't know how else to figure out how it works. You know there's some kind of secret kid culture lurking around right under your nose, but you can't figure it out, and you're especially baffled and scared when you express how odd it is and they get mad at you for being weird. Oh, how you hate the sound of yelling! It rips your eardrums to pieces, makes you shake, and you want to run away but you can't even though there are plenty of escape routes because it's against school rules to leave the classroom for any reason unless you have to go to the bathroom, and you can't stay in the bathroom for too long because you'll miss some lessons that might be important.

But you don't mind not being normal. You don't see what the big deal is about wearing those short skirts (You hate skirts and dresses with a passion. Yuck! What if mean, smelly boys come up to you and trip you and they see your underwear and make fun of you for the rest of your life? Plus, you don't like how the cold, woody, splintery desk chairs feel on your skin and underwear) and using bad words when you're not supposed to. Not only that, it always seems to change every week or so. One week, everybody's obsessed with some rap singer or something, and the week after that, nobody likes him or his songs anymore. It's all so confusing. You wonder if you're on some alien planet that's different from everything you know, like Princess Kaguya.

You absolutely love the story of Princess Kaguya, or The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter. It was in the fourth grade when your class had to read the story once day. Everybody around you complained about it being boring, uninteresting, unexciting, and dumb. But you didn't think that at all. You were entranced. You loved the plight of the princess, who was loved by her new family even though she was from a magical fairy kingdom on the moon, and you loved how bold she was in refusing to marry those guys and her reasons for not doing so. You do wish she stayed with her adoptive family, though. But other than that, you ate that story up like a cat clawing its prey. Ever since then, you begged your mother to find the story in a book somewhere. On your tenth birthday, you got lots of goodies on your birthday, like a Japanese folklore collection with the Kaguya story in it! You admit you liked your new Moomin books better, but you always found time to read the tiny Princess Kaguya story.

You wonder if maybe you're secretly an alien creature from some magical fairy kingdom from the moon, just like Princess Kaguya. Maybe that's why you're not normal compared to everybody else. Maybe you have secret alien powers no human being has, like magic or teleportation or things like that. There were times when you used to jump off the foot of your bed and flap your arms really hard to see if you could fly like a bird. You never did (She never got hurt doing this). You concentrated really hard to see if you could teleport. You never did. You put your circle shaped fingers around your eyes to see if you could shoot laser eye beams. You never did. You finally realize you don't have superpowers, but you don't understand what it is about you that everyone else considers weird, and they treat you like you're one of those evil aliens from outer space who come to Earth to eat everybody's brains just for stupid stuff, like saying the wrong thing or liking cartoons when you're not supposed to (who cares about that, you say to yourself. At least the shows you watch are nice, and don't involve lots of yelling or fighting, or drugs or alcohol or silly love triangles). You definitely remember playing aliens with kids in kindergarten, where you'd chase everybody around with your hands shaped like cat claws and shouting "BRAAAAIIIIIIINS!" with everybody laughing and screaming and running away. That was a lot of fun.

At least your family loves you for who you are, though! You love cuddling up to your dad and snuggling on his lap, and he would stroke your raven black hair with his rugged hands gently, like you're a kitten curling up on his lap, feeling like a cute housepet being scratched behind her ears. You think maybe you're like a cat to them. Maybe a nice soft, brown, yellow, and white calico kitty who rubs against everyone's legs and then goes off to sleep, basking underneath the warm and huggy sunlight, or if it's night time, underneath the millions of stars and the pretty round white moon that kind of looks like a piece of those white gumballs you'd see in the candy machines in the stores where you have to pay a quarter to get one out.

You like day time, but you like night time best. You wish you could stay up all night like the night time animals do and watch the moon all the time. You like the moon and its changing shape every day. One day it'll look like one of her chewed off finger nails and another time it'll be as round and full as a white gumball candy. You don't like gum or those gumball candies, but you love the moon, and you always look at it, wondering if there's a magical fairy kingdom there where Princess Kaguya lives now. There could be lots of nice aliens on there-maybe aliens shaped like cats! You'd love that!-who would love her and appreciate everything you do, and not yell at you or get angry over stupid things. Maybe there'll be lots of flowers and sunny skies and pink clouds and even a Moomin house, like in Moominvalley where her favorite Moomins live.

You could draw anything and everything every day, and your dad would give you a nice big kiss on your cheek and call you his little Salvador Dali, even though you have no idea who or what Dali is. You could dress up as a cat all you like and pretend to be a cat and the magical moon fairy kitty aliens would do the same. You'd watch Moomins and Maple Town all the time, pretend to be superheroes saving the world from great evil, play on the swing for hours and hours even when it's time for bed, and just be happy. You'd draw the kitty alien fairy people and their spaceship which you think must have dropped you on this odd planet by accident. If you want, you could take your parents and siblings there, too, and they'd be just as happy as you are. There'd be no fighting, no drama, nothing silly like that.

You'll be a cat alien, draw every day, and watch Moomins every day, you decide. You don't really like the normal people you're surrounded by, and you're not missing out on that secret club they have where everyone else goes to learn how to be a normal person. It's probably no fun. You bet it's boring compared to being a cat.


	20. Tension Among Family

Chapter 19: Tension Among Family! A Strained Mother-Daughter Relationship

At Okoru Law Offices, in a town far away from Hikaribashi by at least three hours, a woman with curling blonde hair streaming down to her shoulders sat behind a mahogany desk, looking through some files of a case she just received. The walls were a cold, buttery yellow, and it didn't emit any kind of warmth at all. The mahogany shelves, filled to the crack with books, mostly law books, stood tall and firm, cold and unmoving, as dull as the room they were in. The light bulb in the red and orange stained glass Tiffany lamp lit the room somewhat, but even it did not emit any kind of warmth. The shades were open just enough to let some light in.

She gently dusted off her name plate. Prosecutor Katsumi Reika. After that, she went back to looking over the file with a solemn, unperturbed look on her face. The contents of the case were mostly petty: a woman filing a lawsuit against a local video store for buying an R-rated horror movie, not knowing it wasn't a movie for children. She could win this case easy. But the actual court meeting wasn't until next week, so Reika had plenty of time to prepare. She tapped her finger on her desk confidently before closing the file.

A sense of deja vu overtook her, but not to a point where it made her lose her cool. In a way, she saw herself in the woman filing the suit. She wished she had that kind of courage. The courage to point out that children are seeing things that they really shouldn't and try to make an effort to protect them, even if it was the woman's own fault for not looking at the age rating on the back. Reika wished she was that bold.

_'Anzu...I wonder how she's doing...'_ Reika thought with her hand rested on her cheek, her elbow firmly pressing against the desk.

Her mind wandered off, tracking down some thoughts about Anzu. Reika wished she could just be there with Anzu, teaching her right, setting her on the right path, sending her to great private schools where she would receive the best education, and hoping to instill some feminine interests in her to keep her from going astray. Why couldn't she have gotten custody of Anzu instead of Junnosuke? As far as Reika was concerned, it was his fault Anzu was behaving and dressing the way she was.

Just remembering his name made Reika shudder with distaste. _'Junnosuke...he has no ambitions or sense of control. He can't even discipline her correctly,' _Reika dug her fingernails into her palm and grinded her teeth. She should have been more assertive. Fought harder. Taken control like she should have from the beginning. If he didn't stand in her way, she would be at his house right now, being a mother to the only daughter she had.

Silently hating Junnosuke hadn't lost its novelty quite yet, as far as Reika was concerned.

She turned to her right. There was one thing that stood out like a sore thumb in her room, and that was a dried up bowl made out of red Play-Doh clay, with little light blue clay lines and purple and pink clay dots going all around it. The only thing inside it was a pair of sapphire earrings. Reika smiled at the bowl, fixating on the initials carved into it with a needle. CA. Chino Anzu.

(flashback)

_Reika sat in the dining room, reading the newspaper contentedly. The door flung open, and a four year old Anzu stormed into the room, all smiles, her lime green eyes twinling. A dusting of pink graced her plump cheeks. "Mommy! Mommy!"_

_Reika turned around and smiled. "Hi, Anzu. How was school?"_

_Unbeknownst to them, Junnosuke glared at her scornfully. "It was great!" Anzu chimed in. "I made somethin' for you!"_

_"Really? What is it?"_

_Anzu rummaged through her pink book bag and pulled out a little clay bowl before handing it to Reika. "Here! A present!"_

_Reika was touched. Her heart was enveloped by a gentle warmth. "My! What a cute little bowl! Did you make this?"_

_Anzu nodded quickly. "In art class!"_

_Reika put a hand to her mouth, unable to contain her joy. Never had she received such a nice gift from a family member, especially one filled with genuine love, made by their own hands. Reika had always dreamed of being loved back, as she had a life where she was scolded more often than thanked. Reika took Anzu in her arms and trapped her in an embrace._

_"I love it. Thank you so much, Anzu," Reika said in a choked voice, as though she was close to tears._

(end flashback)

Right then and there, the phone on her desk rang. _Ring ring ring ring_. Reika was quick to pick it up. "Hello?"

_"Reika? Is that you?"_ An old woman asked in a raspy voice.

Reika brushed some hair out of her face before letting out an exasperated sigh. She hoped this was a dream. But it wasn't. "Hello, Mother. How'd you get my number?"

_"My friend's daughter told me you helped her win a court case, and she gave me your business card,"_ The old woman replied matter of factly. Reika noticed that her voice was quite hoarse, and adopted a raspy tone to it. A clear sign of her mother's age.

"What do you want?" Reika asked bitterly. She never expected to have her mother of all people call her, especially not like this.

_"I wanted to ask how you're doing. We haven't talked in years. There's a lot we need to catch up on,"_ Her mother replied.

Reika gripped the phone tightly. The urge to throw it at the wall consumed her, but she refrained from doing so. "Since when did you start caring about me?! I have enough on my plate as it is with Junnosuke filing for divorce! I don't need you ordering me around!"

_"Reika. I'm not the woman I used to be. You're right. I did make mistakes when you were younger, and...I'm sorry for all of it,"_ Her mother said.

Reika gasped a little. She had never heard her mother sound so tired, so sad, so...remorseful. For a moment, she thought it was a ploy. But she knew that tone of voice anywhere. Her brothers often used that tone when they got dumped by various girlfriends. Not only that, her mother apologized. Her mother never apologized for anything. Was this really her mother, the strict, stern, domineering woman who shaped every facet of her life by criticizing everything she did and shaping her into the ideal daughter? The fact that her mother reached out to her after all this time seemed to say something. But what?

_"I know it won't do much good now, but...if you ever need anything, I'm here for you."_

Reika smiled. She especially didn't expect those words to come out of her mother of all people. But she had been wanting to hear those very words for years. All of her attempts to do so had always failed. Perhaps...

"Actually, there is something I need help with."

She wasn't sure if she could do it. But she had to try. This was an opportunity she thought she could take, because at this point, she was at her wit's end.

* * *

(dream)

_"Hey, An-chan! Wait for me!"_

_A young Anzu, dressed in a red shirt, black jeans, and red and white sneakers ran across an empty, grassy soccer field, with another girl chasing her happily. The other girl also had blonde hair, but shorter and tied into two little braided pig tails. The girl was wearing a pink shirt, a ruffled brown skirt, purple tennis shoes, and white socks._

_"You can't catch me, Urara!" Anzu teased happily._

_Urara donned an angry face. "Yes I will! Hyah!" She sprinted toward Anzu and leaped on her, sending them both rolling on the grass. Some blades of grass got caught on their hair and clothes. Once they got up, they looked at each other's faces and laughed at how messy they got._

_"Won't your mom get mad if she sees you all covered in dirt and grass? I know how much you hate being dirty," Anzu said, taking some grass out of Urara's hair._

_"It's no biggie. I can always take a bath when I get home, and I don't care what Mom thinks," Urara replied calmly, brushing some dirt off of her knees and arms. One of her ribbons almost fell off of her left braid, but Urara managed to tie it back on._

_Anzu noticed a small scrape on her friend's wrist. "Oh! You're hurt!"_

_"Really?" Urara looked down and saw the scrape. "Huh. I am."_

_"Hold on a sec," Anzu pulled out a napkin and wrapped it around Urara's wrist, covering the fresh scrape. "It'll have to do."_

_Urara smiled. "Thanks."_

_Anzu smiled back. "You're welcome," Anzu had to admit, she was surprised that Urara wasn't reacting more hysterically to the injury. Normally, girly girls like Urara would flip out if they even so much as get their clothes dirty or break a nail. Despite her prim, proper, girly girl looks, Urara definitely wasn't the easily flustered type._

'Note to self: don't judge people by looks,'_ Anzu told herself._

_Urara stood up and wiped some dirt off her clothes. Anzu did the same. "Hey, An! Urara!"_

_A messy haired, brown eyed boy waved at them from afar, flanked by another boy dressed entirely in black. The other boy had brown hair and warm, dark blue eyes. Anzu turned to face them as soon as she heard the messy haired kid's voice. She and Urara ran over to them excitedly. "Hey, Hikari! Mitsuru! You made it!"_

_Mitsuru put a hand on his hip and smiled. "You know I wouldn't miss a get-together like this for the world."_

_Hikari laid down a box and pulled some makeshift costumes out. "I got our costumes and everything!"_

_"Cool! I wanna be the princess!" Urara pulled out a sparkly plastic tiara._

_Anzu pulled out a plastic sword. "I'll be a dragon slayer!"_

_Mitsuru pulled out a plushy dragon mask and stuck it on his head. "Guess I'm a dragon, huh?" Mitsuru looked around confusedly. Hikari, Anzu, and Urara broke into laughter. Suddenly, the dragon masked Mitsuru began shouting pretend roars. "Raaaaawwwr! I'm a dragon who came to burn this kingdom down for no reason!"_

_"Eeeek! A dragon! How scary!" Urara whined, falling to her knees._

_Anzu and Hikari drew out their plastic swords, ready for a pretend showdown. "Don't worry, princess! Your faithful knights will protect you!" Anzu edicted._

_"Take this, you fire breathing lizard! Hyah!" Hikari shouted and charged at dragon Mitsuru. The two boys and Anzu began showing off their bad acting skills, and Urara was running around laughing so she could be part of the fun._

_"I will kill you all!" Mitsuru roared._

_"Not on my watch! Oof!" Hikari was about to charge at him, but Mitsuru slipped and fell right on top of his friend. Mitsuru's dragon mask came right off. Urara grabbed it before it could roll away. But the two girls found themselves bursting into laughter._

_"You two are too much!" Urara choked out through her laughter._

_"Get off me!" Hikari complained before pushing Mitsuru off of him._

_"Ow! That hurt!"_

_"Now now, you two. Don't fight," Urara told them calmly. Mitsuru wiped some dirt off his pants before helping Hikari up._

_"Thanks, dude."_

_"Sorry about that."_

_"It's okay."_

_"The tree house is just down there. Wanna go hang out in there for a bit?" Anzu pointed to some nearby trees in a forest._

_"I'm all for it," Mitsuru chimed in._

_Urara smiled and clasped her hands together. "Me too!"_

_"Race ya there!" Hikari was the first to dash toward the forest._

_"Awwww, no! I'm not gonna let you get there before me!" Anzu chased after him. Urara and Mitsuru followed suit. The four kids were smiling and laughing, enjoying their time together._

(end dream)

Anzu woke up with messy hair and bleary eyes. But her room was lit up by the morning light, revealing the white walls of her bedroom, some of which were covered by some anime and horror movie posters. Anzu got out of bed, straightened out the sheets, and put some stuffed animals on it to make it look nice. After that, she pulled out her attire for the day: an orange shirt, blue capris, and a black hoodie.

Once she got dressed, she put a green scrunchie in her hair to hold up her large ponytail. She rubbed her eyes before putting on her coke bottle glasses. She went downstairs, grabbed a glass cup, opened a milk carton and poured some milk. "Good morning, Anzu," Junnosuke said. He's her father.

"Morning," Anzu sipped the milk. _Ching!_ Some toasted bread popped out of a toaster. Junnosuke took it out, spread some butter around it, and handed it to Anzu. Anzu grabbed a banana and sat down at the table. Junnosuke joined her with a mug of coffee in his hands.

"Nice day out, isn't it?" Junnosuke asked with a smile.

Anzu nodded in agreement as she chomped on a slice of toast. She couldn't wait to hang out with Riko, Marina, and Kyoya today. But she noticed that her father had some bags under his eyes, and his eyes themselves were bleary, like Junnosuke had trouble sleeping. Then again, as far as Anzu knew, he had problems sleeping most of the time. She always saw sleeping pill containers in the cupboards when she would get the box of crackers out.

"Is something wrong, Dad? You don't look well," Anzu asked with concern peppering her voice. It always worried her to see her father tired.

"It's nothing. I'm not sick or anything," Junnosuke told her as Anzu ate another piece of banana. "But..." Junnosuke's expression turned grim. "There is something you need to know."

"Hm?"

"Last night your mother called. She says she wants to come and visit us tomorrow."

Anzu stopped eating right then and there. "...What?" That was all she could choke out. "How did...how did she even find our home address?"

"She must have hired an investigator or something. She has connections. But..." Junnosuke folded his hands. "She says she wants to see you."

"Why?" The more Anzu heard, the more unbelievable everything sounded. Anzu wanted to run away. Get to school already. But her body didn't move.

"I don't know. She was insistent and said she'll be coming at about twelve. But, umm...I was wondering. Would it be okay if your friends came over tomorrow, too?"

"Huh?" Anzu was surprised at the many changes this conversation was enduring.

"I think I might know of a way to convince Reika to not worry so much about you. If it's okay, have your friends come over and hang out. If Reika sees that they're nice kids, it'll give her an opportunity to understand you, see what your life is like a little bit, and maybe it'll convince her that you're not doing anything questionable just by being different and hanging out with different people. I don't know if it'll work, but it's something, right?"

Anzu didn't know what to say. All that came out of her mouth was a solemn, "Sure."

Anzu balled her fists before finishing her food and getting ready for school. With that, the conversation was over.

Junnosuke couldn't blame Anzu for her reaction-or lack thereof. Their relationship had always been strained, and despite Junnosuke's best efforts, his marriage with Reika fell apart. He knew that Anzu deserved a life where she could be a kid and be herself. Silently, he drank some coffee and got himself ready for the day.

* * *

When Junnosuke dropped Anzu off, the first thing she saw was Marina and Kyoya throwing words at each other like they were arguing. Thankfully, they weren't.

"Iron Man!" Kyoya exclaimed.

"Batman!" Marina snapped back.

"Iron Man!"

"Batman!"

Riko and Fukiko just watched them with confused looks on their faces. Anzu approached them. "What's going on?"

"They're arguing over which superhero would win a slap fight," Fukiko explained.

"Iron Man!"

"Batman!"

Kyoya turned to Anzu once he took notice of her presence and waved at her for her attention. "Anzu! Anzu! Who would win in a slap fight? Iron Man or Batman?"

"No questions asked. Iron Man," Anzu deadpanned.

Marina facepalmed.

"What? Just because I'm your friend doesn't mean I agree with everything you say or do," Anzu retorted.

"Okay. So...Spiderman, or...the Hulk?" Kyoya asked.

It took them both a second to decide. "The Hulk."

Right then and there, the bell rang, and everyone stormed into school. Riko couldn't help but ask Kyoya a question. "Kyo-chan? What do your parents do? For jobs, I mean."

"My dad works at a travel agent, and my mom usually works at Citizen's Bank, but during the day she gives out food to the homeless at this place the church runs called Free Food Frenzy. I usually help out during the summer, but it's open all year long," Kyoya explained matter-of-factly.

"I've never been to one of those before," Fukiko said a little shyly, clutching her copy of a glittery magazine called _Pika*Pika Pretty Boy_ tightly.

All of a sudden, Kyoya's face lit up. "Hey! I know! My mom says kids can volunteer there, so would you guys like to come by some time?"

"I wouldn't mind going. Heck, I wouldn't mind volunteering even. Maybe it'd help me with my anger issues somewhat. I have karate lessons today so I can't go, but tomorrow will work for me," Marina said, intertwining her own fingers together and putting them behind her head.

"I'll have to ask my parents. They usually tell me to stay away from homeless people. I don't know why. I think it's because they think all homeless people are mean or drug addicts, but I don't think so," Riko said.

"No, they're not all mean or drug addicts. I've met a lot of them and they're actually really nice and friendly. You do have to be careful around some of them, though," Kyoya said.

"My mom is always on my back about doing more for the community, so I wouldn't mind checking it out. Maybe it'll be fun," Fukiko said with a smile this time, feeling a little more relaxed.

"I have nothing better to do, so I'll check it out," Anzu piped in.

"Is something wrong, An-chan?" Riko asked innocently. "You look kinda sad."

"Yeah, Riko's right. You do look a little down. Wanna talk about it?" Marina asked.

Anzu told them everything about her mother's upcoming visit. "Your mom sounds like my mom," Fukiko said.

"Yeah. She and my dad hardly ever got along for their own reasons, and she especially doesn't like that I like wearing black, watching horror movies, or even playing video games. She wants me to be this perfect kid and doesn't seem to get that being different or liking some gross or scary stuff doesn't mean I'm gonna turn into some psycho murderer. She flipped out one time when I was trying to watch a cat video and an advertisement for The Ghost Catchers was playing. She threatened to sue the studio for _'corrupting my sensibilities,'_" Anzu folded two fingers on each hand at that last part.

"Isn't that going a bit overboard?" Marina asked.

"That's what I say," Anzu agreed.

"Your mom sounds harsh," Riko said.

"She is," Anzu agreed again. "But here's the thing. My dad wants you all to come over my house tomorrow. He thinks that if she sees how nice you are, she may change her views a little bit, but I don't think it'll end well. I don't want you to get caught in our family drama."

"Umm...I wouldn't mind going to your house tomorrow," Fukiko told her shyly.

Anzu did a double take. "Huh?! You serious?!"

"I'm in," Marina added.

"Me too," Kyoya said.

Riko raised a hand. "Me three! But I have to ask my parents, though."

"Wait, you're okay with this?!" Anzu found herself absolutely flabbergasted "I mean, she's gonna yell at you all and criticize your looks and hobbies for sure! I've seen what she's like!"

"So? I think it'd be great to give her a reality check. Besides, you're our friend. If she messes with you, she messes with us," Kyoya said.

"That's true!" Riko added.

"We can handle it, Anzu. Ooh! An even better idea! Maybe we can take her with us to the soup kitchen. They say actions speak louder than words. This'll be the perfect chance!" Marina explained calmly.

Riko wrapped her arm around Anzu like a real friend would. "Friends are always there for each other, right?"

Anzu found herself getting misty eyed. They already reminded her of Urara, Hikari, and Mitsuru. "Everyone...you're all so great..." After that, since tomorrow was a Saturday, Anzu told everyone they could come over as early as ten.

The school day went by without incident or difficulty, but Riko felt a looming sense of dread when her math teacher-Mr. Ikari-told them about a very important math test coming up, telling the kids that they really need to study and go over everything they've learned so they can pass. Riko made a mental note to study for it when she got home. When Arinao picked her up from school this time, Riko asked him and Saki if they could go to Anzu's house at ten in the morning, and Free Food Frenzy at three. She expected them to say no. But much to her surprise, they said yes!

"I don't see why not. Maybe you can actually give them soup. This'll be a good learning experience for you," Arinao reasoned with a bright smile on his face. "Plus, your friends will be there too, so I'm sure you'll be fine. But you have to stay with them at all times and not talk to strangers, okay?"

"I promise!" Riko told them happily.

"We'll pick you up at about 5:00 PM tomorrow so you won't miss dinner. Is that alright?" Saki said.

Riko nodded vigorously. "That's fine!"

When Saturday opened its doors, the kids and fairies all gathered at Anzu's house. Junnosuke welcomed them inside warmly. Riko brought her Jenga box with her, so they started off by playing that. As usual, when Marina toppled the blocks over, she blew her top. "No fair! I want a rematch!"

After that, they went to Anzu's room to watch funny videos on YouTube, namely videos of cats and dogs being cute, AMVs, or epic rap battles, read some books together, and went downstairs to have lunch. Junnosuke made hot pot with plenty of noodles, vegetables, and even some egg rolls. Riko slipped some for the fairies so they could have something to eat.

Fukiko tried to grab some tempura, only to find all of it gone...and the culprit wasn't hard to point out. "Marina! You ate all the tempura!"

The end of a shrimp tail stuck out of Marina's mouth. She swallowed it immediately. Anzu was quick to grab some daikon and hanpen. "Really, Mari. You should have let Fu-chan have some."

"Sorry," Marina said.

"I have an egg roll if you want it," Riko handed an egg roll to Fukiko.

She smiled and took it right away. "Thanks, Riko."

"I don't really like tempura," Kyoya piped in.

"I would have liked to have some..." Starbeam mused.

Moombeam put a reassuring hand on Starbeam's shoulder. "It's okay. We can have some next time."

Starbeam nodded in agreement.

_Ping pong._

"I'll get it!" Junnosuke was quick to walk to the door and open it.

A feeling of dread began to creep over Anzu. The air in the house suddenly became tense. A fair skinned woman with a slender frame, blonde hair streaming down her shoulders, and dark brown eyes with a cold, stern glint about them walked into the room with a solemn expression on her face. She wore a simple but practical outfit consisting of a long sleeved white shirt, a lightweight brown jacket, a matching medium length skirt, black pantyhose, and brown high heels. She was holding a black leather purse.

The kids all looked at each other with nervous expressions. Reika exuded an imposing, austere atmosphere that made the air around them feel oppressive, like they were being weighed down.

Junnosuke's smile faded when his eyes met those of his ex-wife's. "Hello, Reika."

Reika glared at him, keeping her solemn but cold expression. "Hello, Junnosuke," She hissed the name like it was poison.

As soon as she came into the house, everyone fell silent. But Anzu approached her mother with a nervous but cool demeanor. "Hello, Mom."

"Hello, Anzu. You've grown. How've you been?"

"Alright. Oh! Um...I have my friends over. I'll introduce you!" Anzu gestured for her friends to come over, and they did. "These are my friends. This is Asagi Marina, Dounowaki Fukiko, Mitomo Kyoya, and Tasogare Riko."

"Hi," Fukiko said with a polite bow.

"How's it goin'?" Marina held a hand up.

Riko shyly hid behind Anzu but waved her hand meekly and uttered an audible, "Hello."

"You...must be hungry. We have hot pot if you want some," Junnosuke said nervously.

"Thank you. It's been a long drive," Reika sat down and treated herself to some hot pot. It was still warm. But she had to admit, it was quite delicious. It had been a while since she had hot pot, and the smell was already bringing back memories from her childhood. Her mother would make hot pot just like this, and she and her brothers would gather around, fighting over the daikon, egg rolls, tempura, and other things, much to their mother's consternation.

Sunbeam gently nudged Anzu on the arm. "Your dad's a great cook," She whispered.

"Thanks."

"Still wearing your goth attire, I see," Reika said coldly.

"Mom. I'm not a goth. I just like wearing the clothes. They're comfy," Anzu told her with a groan. Anzu had told her this lots of times, but Reika was insistent on calling every black piece of clothing in her wardrobe goth clothes, no matter how many times Anzu corrected her. With this, Reika still didn't get it.

"I do hope you'll grow out of that silly phase by the time you go to high school. Come, come! Sit down at the table! It's rude to just stand there while lunch is being served."

"Reika. They already had their fill. It's okay," Junnosuke told her, but the kids gathered at the table regardless and had some more food. Riko grabbed a piece of konyaku and gave it to Lovebeam for her to eat. She hated how it tasted, but she didn't dare voice her dislike, as she didn't want Reika to find them out.

Reika examined all the kids with imposing, cold eyes. Riko shivered at the sight of her, wishing she could go somewhere and hide. "Why is your hair so short? You look like a little boy," Reika said.

Riko pouted at her. "You should grow it out. You'll look more like a lady that way."

"Reika! Show some restraint!"

Reika shot an angry look in her ex-husband's direction.

Riko leaned toward Anzu. "Is your mom always like this?" She whispered.

"Pretty much. She thinks it's okay for her to be rude and criticize people's choices but not when we call her out on her hypocrisy," Anzu whispered back.

"It's rude to whisper!" Reika exclaimed before eating a piece of daikon. "Is there any coffee? I have a headache."

"I'll make some right away," Junnosuke went into the kitchen nervously.

Fukiko found herself scratching her head. Reika suddenly glared at Marina. "That scar on your face is very unsightly."

Marina found herself offended by that comment, and was going to tell her that, but Riko beat her to it. "It's rude to make comments about people's appearance!"

"It's even more rude to talk back to an adult, young lady!" Reika snapped back.

Marina crossed her arms, appalled by this woman's childishness. "So it's okay for you to call us out on what we do, but not okay for us to call you out on being rude?"

"Now now! Calm down!" Anzu immediately got in between them, fearing a fight would break out. "Hey, Mom! Your favorite soap opera is on! It's almost 12:30 isn't it?"

"Secrets and Tears starts at one, Anzu. You should know this by now," Reika said. Junnosuke placed a coffee mug on the table rather harshly.

"Reika? Can we talk in the hall for a moment?" Junnosuke hissed. He and Reika marched into the hall. Marina, Kyoya, and Fukiko immediately followed.

"Hey! Don't eavesdrop!" Anzu whispered. Riko stayed at the dining room, grabbing a piece of broccoli and giving it to Moonbeam.

"Wow, and people say I'm rude," Lovebeam said.

"Yeah. What a hypocrite," Sunbeam added.

Even at the dining room table, Riko could hear Junnosuke and Reika arguing in the hall. "Why are you doing this, Reika? You just waltz in here and criticize the kids for no reason!"

"I have a right to see my daughter. You haven't changed at all, Junnosuke. You're letting her hang out with these brats. That short haired girl looks like a hikikomori and that boy is in a wheelchair!"

"Her friends are good kids. Stop acting like you have to decide everything for Anzu and me!"

"If I don't raise Anzu right, who will? I know you're still doing a sloppy job at parenting!"

"You're the one being rude and childish here!"

Not wanting to hear any more, the kids flocked into the living room. "Wow, Anzu. You were right about your mom. She's worse than my mom," Fukiko said.

Marina covered her scar with her hand, her gold eyes donning a scornful glare. "It's not my fault some woman attacked me in a frenzy!" She muttered through grinded teeth.

"Yeah. Sorry, guys. My mom's a nitpicker. Always pointing out people's flaws and criticizing," Anzu deadpanned.

"No wonder your dad divorced her," Kyoya added.

"Anyone up for a game of Go Fish? I brought cards with me," Marina said, pulling out a deck of cards.

The kids gathered around the floor and began their card game. They were so absorbed in their game that they didn't notice Reika coming into the living room and watching them with a surprised, almost soft expression. The sight of Anzu happily playing with her friends was almost alien to her. Anzu was laughing, her smile radiant. The other kids were enjoying themselves, too.

Reika wasn't sure what to make of it. She just stood there, frozen with confusion. After a short while, her face contorted, and a soft look appeared in her eyes. _'Reika...you're her mother. You should be happy that your daughter is happy instead of criticizing her and her friends so much,_' The sight reminded her of the times Reika would stay after school for a long time just to talk with her friends and hang out, and when her mother would be away, she would sneak out of the house and go to their houses to hang out with them. Reika preferred the company of her friends than her own strict, cold, uncaring mother.

After that, Reika didn't say a word to anyone, not even the kids. She didn't even criticize anyone. She just watched Anzu and her newfound friends happily enjoy each other's company. A warm glow began to encase Reika's normally cold heart. A smile began to creep on her face, but she kept a hand over her mouth so nobody would see. Even Junnosuke found himself smiling.

Later, at about two thirty, Anzu approached Reika calmly. "Umm...my friends and I are gonna go volunteer at the local soup kitchen. Do you, um...want to come?"

Reika's eyes widened a bit, and her smile faded. The cold, stern look in her eyes didn't return, but she found herself surprised yet again. Since when did Anzu want to volunteer at soup kitchens? Reika had to admit, this was a nice thing for her daughter to do. "I don't see why not. I suppose I can accompany you. But I do hope you'll be on your best behavior, Anzu. I don't want people there getting the wrong idea about you." _'Come on, Reika! You're going to a soup kitchen! Nobody's going to care about Anzu's appearance or how she behaves! You should at least know this much!'_ Reika wished she could put a lid on her mouth.

Soon, Junnosuke got all the kids in the car. Kyoya brought his manual wheelchair with him, and it could be folded up, so Junnosuke had no trouble putting it in the trunk. Free Food Frenzy wasn't far from the school. It was a relatively average sized red brick building with lots of windows, with huge flocks of homeless people waiting outside in lines. The inside of it certainly looked very new and well maintained, with lots of people in the kitchen preparing all kinds of food for homeless people.

The kids sans Kyoya couldn't believe how many homeless people there were. They never saw so many in one place before. Some of them looked like normal people one would find on the street with clean clothes, and some looked so dirty and unkempt that they looked like they lived underneath dirt for decades, complete with missing or yellow teeth, tattered clothes, body odor, unkempt hair and beards, and dirty hands and feet. One person was wearing nothing but tattered jeans. No shoes, no shirt, nothing else. But they let him in as well.

The kids decided to help out by pouring soup into bowls and passing them out onto the tables. It wasn't as hard as some of the kids expected, but Riko and Fukiko had a bit of trouble even so much as approaching some people, mostly because they looked at them with scary faces or looked like they'd hurt them. But they squelched their uncomfortable feelings of fear and went through with it anyway. Some said thank you while others scarfed down their food right off, like they hadn't eaten in years.

Riko felt grateful for having a house and parents who care about her, but her heart did go out to these people, wishing she could do so much more for them. But what could she do, other than pass out food? She wished her Pretty Cure powers could magically give everybody homes and food and all of those things, but she knew that wasn't possible. Anime and manga weren't like real life. She learned that the hard way. However, she bumped into one homeless person, and unbeknownst to her, one of her Moomin books fell out of her purse. A man wearing a red scarf, a dark blue hat, and a heavy, tattered beige jacket picked it up.

Reika watched in awe. Her kids were giving out food and water to homeless people, saying please and thank you, and the recipients praised them for their kindness. Reika found herself frozen and very out of place in this new world, in her clean, ironed prosecutor outfit and her rose scented hair amongst these dirty, tattered people. But the kids blended in nicely and didn't make a big deal about their appearances. Reika locked her lip.

"Is this your first time here?" Reika turned around to find Kayoko next to her.

"Y-Yes," Reika stammered.

"I can tell. You're pretty nervous."

"I-I'm just making sure Anzu behaves herself! Who knows what the kids might do here! Children are always prone to throwing tantrums!"

Kayoko blinked. "Oh? Are you...Anzu's mother?"

Reika nodded and glared like Kayoko should have known that.

Kayoko smiled. clasping her hands together. "You're daughter is such a good girl! She's been a great friend to my Kyoya. My son hasn't exactly had the best time, but ever since Riko, Anzu, and the others came into his life, he's starting to get back to his old self, and that makes me happy. You're lucky to have such a great daughter."

Reika's eyes widened. She thought her ears were playing tricks on her at first. But in a way, Kayoko was right, and Reika could see it. Reika watched as Anzu gave food to people and helped her friends out whenever she could, and people always thanked her for it. Reika had never seen this before, because she was always either at court or at home, and the only things she heard about any friends were the stories that Anzu would tell, and Reika decided what her friends were like just from those, nothing else.

The other thing Reika noticed was that none of the homeless people were pointing out Anzu's clothes. They weren't telling her to wear dresses or be more like a lady like Reika would. But then again, why would they when they themselves were wearing old, dirty, and tattered clothes? Reika clutched her skirt. She wished she was more accepting of Anzu's style of dress and personality like they were.

All of a sudden, Anzu dashed into the bathroom. She pummeled through the door and the sound of extremely heavy vomiting caught the ears of many people, including Riko, who went inside to see what was up. It didn't last too long, as the sound faded as soon as the short haired girl came into the bathroom. A tired, pale faced Anzu came out of one of the bathroom stalls. "Uuuugh…"

"You sound really sick. You're pale, too. Do you want to go home?" Riko asked with concern peppering her voice.

"No. It's fine. But I admit, I've been puking a lot more lately. I don't like it," Anzu said as she sat down on a chair.

"I'll ask Kayoko-san if she has a bottle of water. Wait here, okay?" Riko said as she dashed to find Kayoko. It didn't take her long to find her. "Kayoko-san? Are there any water bottles around?"

"They're over in the corner, sweetie," Kayoko said, pointing to a corner of the room where some bottles of water stood. Riko said thanks, grabbed one, and gave it to Anzu. She wasted no time in gulping down some fresh water. However, Riko heard footsteps approaching them.

"Umm...excuse me…" The girls turned around to find a very old homeless man who looked like he was in his seventies or eighties, with a very shriveled up, wrinkled face, donning a thin but long beard that went down to the bottom of his neck. His head was covered by a dark blue snow hat, he was wearing a crimson red scarf, a large beige jacket, tattered black pants, fingerless black gloves, and soft brown shoes.

"Is something wrong?" Riko asked.

The bearded old man pulled out a Moomin book and handed it to Riko. "You dropped this just a few minutes ago."

"Ahhh! My Moominland Midwinter book!" Riko gratefully took the book from the man's hands. "I can't believe I never noticed! Thanks so much, mister...uhh...what's your name?"

The old man smiled. "Call me Takayuki."

"Thank you so much, Takayuki-san!"

"You're welcome. My children used to watch the anime a lot when I was younger."

Riko's eyes suddenly lit up, making her face look like a radiant sunshine, which made the man smile further. "Really!? Really really really?! Wait! Which one? New Moomin or Fun Family Moomin? I know there's three anime, but I only watched the nineties one!"

"The first one you mentioned. I haven't seen the other one, but I hear it's quite popular. Whenever I would tuck my children in bed they'd always ask me to read the books to them as a bedtime story," Takayuki told her kindly with a hearty laugh.

Riko felt her heart go aglow with happiness. Someone else who likes Moomin! Then again, she lent Kyoya one of her books, but he said he hasn't decided whether he likes it yet, so she let him borrow one of her other books today.

"My Mom did too! That's how I got into them! She even showed me the anime! I have all the DVDs and all the books! I wanna see the other anime versions, but they don't make DVDs for it."

Soon, Riko and Takayuki fell far into their hearty and joyful conversation about Moomins. Anzu smiled upon seeing those two light up upon finding a mutual interest. It didn't look like Riko ever had conversations like these very often, so she figured she treats them like a holy treat. Anzu was happy for her regardless. Later on, Riko had to get called back to the kitchen to give out more soup, so they had to stop. But she was happy she found a new friend, even if he's much older than her, and less fortunate.

Reika, however, watched and had different thoughts. Just seeing Riko and Takayuki talk like they were best friends over something trivial seemed to leave a bad taste in her mouth. She had to wonder if Riko's parents failed to teach her not to talk to strangers. If Reika had her way, she wouldn't let Anzu anywhere near a homeless person, let alone an entire building full of them. Reika had always cultivated bad, untrue ideas about homeless people, and even though she kept a lid on her mouth today, she wanted to scold Riko for even talking with him. It didn't help that Marina and Fukiko were doing the same thing with others.

"You okay?"

Reika turned around, thinking that voice belonged to Anzu, but it turned out to be someone else. A young girl about Anzu's age with messy black hair and blue green eyes, wearing a simple, dirty brown shirt, a long dark blue skirt, white sneakers, and black socks. "You look sad," The girl said in a kind, sweet voice.

Reika didn't bother to look at her. "I'm not sad. I'm just thinking."

The girl smiled, rummaged through her pocket, and pulled out a small white flower. "Here you go! A present for you!"

Reika's eyes widened. Why was this homeless girl giving her a flower? But thinking it'd be rude to refuse, she silently took the flower. "Thank you."

"You're welcome! Hope you have a good day!"

An older girl suddenly snuck up on the girl from behind. "Umi! Are you going to eat dinner or what?!" She took the younger girl by the arm and dragged her away from Reika, but not before Umi smiled and waved at Reika.

Reika stashed the flower in her purse. Later, when more volunteers came in, the kids decided they were finished. It was almost four thirty, and some of them needed to be back by five. Fukiko stretched her arms out. "Whew! That was actually kinda fun!"

"I wouldn't mind doing that again some time. It was a little loud, though," Riko said.

"You feeling okay, Anzu?" Kyoya asked.

"I'm better now. Thanks," Anzu told him reassuringly. But her heart was drowning in a sea of doubts.

"I wish Hotaru-chan could have come. I called her earlier but she said she was out with her family," Riko said.

"It's okay. Hotaru deserves a break once in a while. She's in high school and doesn't have a lot of free time like we do, and it's not her fault," Kyoya said. "We can invite her next time."

"I'm sure she would love that," Starbeam said.

"Ugh! That place was so smelly!" Lovebeam complained.

"Oh, bite your tongue! It's rude to say things like that!" Moonbeam scolded lightly.

"But it's true!"

"Sorry you didn't get to do much," Riko told the fairies.

"It's okay. I liked seeing all this new stuff," Sunbeam told her cheerfully. "It taught me a lot."

"Ah! Reika's coming!" Fukiko said.

Reika approached them with the same solemn, imposing look. "Anzu. It's time to go. Oh, and children...I'd appreciate it if you didn't come near my child again."

Anzu couldn't contain her anger. "Mom!"

"My daughter deserves a good life. I can't have her being surrounded by homeless people, even if they are kind. I don't know what your lives are like, so I can't trust you. You're not the kind of children my daughter should be associating with."

Anzu stood between her mother and her friends with a fierce glare in her eyes. "Don't talk like that to my friends!"

"We're done here, Anzu. Get in the car," Reika said.

Anzu facepalmed. "Uuuuugh! Sorry, guys. I knew she was going to say that. I told you she was stubborn like a mule."

"We figured as much," Riko said.

"It's okay. I've dealt with a lot of people like that," Kyoya told her.

The day just had to end on a sour note, and both Anzu and Reika didn't like it, but for different reasons altogether. Anzu wished with all her heart that Reika would grow up and understand. But she figured that wasn't likely to happen.


	21. Anzu's Sorrow! Divorce Makes You Vomit!

Chapter 20: Anzu's Sorrow! Divorce Makes You Vomit!

The night sky was quite a dark one, with nary a twinkling star in sight. Only huge, thick rolls of clouds covered the night sky, making it a lot darker than it should be. It certainly didn't help Anzu sleep very well. She kept tossing and turning underneath the blue and white comforter of her bed, clutching her black bat plushie like she wanted it to come to life and save her. Her face was drowning in sweat, and she felt warm every time she tossed and turned.

(dream)

_In her soft, orange pajamas, Anzu ran in a dark void like her house was on fire, her lime green eyes wide and filled to the very brim with naked horror and fear. She was hoping to get out of this empty void. Suddenly, a light flashed brightly a little ways away, morphing into her father. She didn't stop running, but as soon as her lime green eyes fixated on her father's smooth black hair, his soft, gentle lime green eyes, and his sweet smile, she could feel a smile of her own being painted on her pale face._

"_DAD!" She yelled as she tried to sprint toward him like she never did before. She could leap on him, embrace him, and they could make plans to do fun things together like they always would. _

_Unfortunately, she felt a strong grip on her arm. A tight, iron grip whose sharp painted finger nails dug into the skin of her arm. "Ow!"_

_She turned around and her eyes drowned in horror again. Her mother had her in her grip._

"_Let me go! I'm not going with you no matter what!" Anzu screamed hysterically as she tried desperately to yank the woman's arm off of her, but nothing worked. It's like her arm was duct taped or super glued to it, planting its roots in there so she could never be ripped off. It definitely doesn't help that the woman has a very austere, stone faced look on her face, completely off setting her extremely shiny red lipstick._

"_Anzu!" Her father yelled sadly._

"_You don't get to decide that. The court has granted me full custody of you, so your words mean absolutely nothing. You should be happy you get to finally be with your mother! That man has obviously poisoned your mind! This will be the perfect antidote!" The woman exclaimed in a stern, icy voice as she tried to drag Anzu away. "Come along now, you brat! I've already picked out the most perfect dresses for you! I've even transferred you to a very prestigious private school where you can learn manners and grow up to be a proper, better behaved young lady, just like I've always wanted!"_

"_NOOO!" Anzu screamed for dear life as she tried to yank the woman's arm off of her to no avail. She even tried kicking her mother, but her legs just seemed to go right through her, like she was a ghost._

"_Anzu! ANZUUU!" Her dad chased after her, but he tripped and the black void beneath him suddenly swallowed him up, causing him to drown in darkness._

"_DAAAAD!" Anzu cried for him to come back, but he didn't. All of a sudden, a white light flashed and suddenly consumed everything._

(end dream)

With a start, Anzu loudly woke in the dark, cloudy gloom of six in the morning, and remembered why she doesn't sleep much these days. Before she could do anything else, her stomach churned, and she knew what she had to do. She dashed into the bathroom and a torrent of whatever was in her stomach yesterday poured right out into the toilet she stuck her face in.

"Anzu!" Her father appeared in a dark green robe with blue stripes, concern painted all over his face as he kneeled to Anzu's level. Finally, she stopped puking and she pulled her sweaty, pale face out of the toilet rim.

"Uuugh…" Anzu groaned like she had been sick for years.

"I'm definitely calling the doctor today," Her father said. "You've been throwing up all night. It's never gotten this bad before."

"Sorry…"

"What are you sorry for, Anzu? You can't help it when this happens."

"Yeah, but I woke you up."

"Don't worry about that. If you want, you can stay home from school."

Anzu wiped her face with a napkin she pulled from a box next to the bathroom sink. "No. It's fine. I can't miss any days. We have some tests coming up and I can't miss any new material," Anzu said as she threw the crumpled napkin into the trash can.

"But I don't want you to throw up while you're at school."

"I know, but I can't miss school. I'll be fine, Dad."

Her father donned a worried expression. _'She's putting up a front. I know she is. She's pushing herself so hard and ignoring all of her problems to protect her sanity,'_ He thought grimly. Even he noticed that his only daughter was vomiting more and more throughout the day. "Well, we're up now, so I'll cook some breakfast. I want you to eat it so you'll at least have some nutrition in your system," He said as he stood up and walked into the kitchen.

Again, Anzu didn't want to eat, fearing she'll throw it all up again, but even she knew her day wouldn't go so good if she didn't have even a little bit of a full stomach, so she slowly and carefully consumed her breakfast for today, which consisted of strawberry flavored yogurt, a banana, and french toast with maple syrup and butter, just as she liked it. She got herself a glass of water to smooth it all down.

'_Please, God. Keep my food in my stomach for once. Please,'_ Anzu thought as she finished her yogurt. When she finished her whole breakfast, she ambled to her room to get dressed. Since the air is getting warmer, she decided to put on a pair of soft black capris with strings dangling from them, a pale blue short sleeved shirt with black flowers drawn on it, white socks, and purple tennis shoes. No black hoodies or bondage pants today. She grabbed her black bookbag and put whatever she needed in it, along with a huge heap of brown paper bags.

Downstairs, her father is on the phone. "Hi, my name is Chino Juunosuke, and I'd like to have an appointment for this week and next. Yes, my daughter's been vomiting a lot, and by a lot I mean almost five to ten times a day now. It's been like this for the past week, and I'm scared for her health. Yes? Oh, this Saturday would be perfect. I have an extra day off that day, so I can make it. Yes, 11:00 AM can work. Yes. That's perfect. Thank you. Bye," With that, Juunosuke hung up the phone. After that, he took Anzu in the car and dropped her off at school.

"If you ever feel sick or need to come home, feel free to give me a call and I'll come running, sweetie," Juunosuke told her worriedly.

"Sure," Anzu replied sheepishly.

"Okay. You have a good day."

"You too."

When she got to homeroom, she didn't realize that some of the brown bags she brought with her were protruding out to the point where Riko couldn't help but notice. "Hi, An-chan. Why do you have all of those paper bags? Are they for a science project?"

Anzu scrambled to cram them into her book bag. "Sorta."

Riko could tell she was lying. Anzu was always straight up with her. This was very unlike her.

The school day went by just fine, except for the history test and spelling tests they had to take. It's a good thing she studied and that the history test is multiple choice. She answered the questions and spelled the words to the best of her ability, hoping she at least passed somewhat. No vomiting so far.

Unfortunately, she felt weary during gym class and had to sit this class out. Not only that, she threw up again, but she managed to get one of her brown bags out just in time. No messes. This didn't stop some kids from laughing at her and gossiping about her from afar, even though Marina and Riko called them out on it. She smiled upon seeing their kind act, happy that they cared about her. She even brought a bottle of water with her in case it happened again. She knew that if she vomited too much, she could dehydrate, and she didn't want that happening. She wound up puking again just before lunch, but it was just a small chunk of it this time, not a huge torrent of stomach contents. Kids laughed, Marina or Riko called them out on it, rinse and repeat.

Thankfully for Anzu, the vomiting stopped as lunch came around. She was able to eat her lunch and keep it down. It helped that all she did during recess was either talk to her friends or play her harmonica, both of which set her heart aglow with relief. She wished she could do all of this forever.

It certainly helped her forget, but it didn't stop her stomach from churning some of the time. She wanted to go to the nurse, but she didn't want to miss any classes that might present material for future tests. Plus, she doesn't want to have to make up any more homework. Fortunately, she got to finish the school day. Her father picked her up and they drove home.

The first thing they saw was Reika glaring at them. "Shouldn't you be in an after school club right about now, young lady?"

Junnosuke glared at her. "Reika. Don't start."

"I'd like to join a drama club but there isn't any," Anzu told her matter-of-factly.

"Goodness, Junnosuke! You don't even make her join a club! It'll do her a great disservice if you can't even so much as-"

"Mom! Enough! I'm not in the mood for your lecturing and hypocrisy! Just go away!" With that, Anzu stormed to her room.

She pulled out her harmonica and played it, hoping it'd calm her down a bit. But the sound that came out of her harmonica sounded rustier and more robotic than normal. She put it away, pulled out her I-pod, and stuck her ladybug shaped ear buds far into her ears, hoping that the lovely voices of Warren Wiebe, Two-Mix, and other metal bands would get Reika's voice out of her head. She could already hear Reika and Junnosuke arguing yet again, but her mind was lost in the music. But in a way, she could still hear the yelling. She wasn't sure why.

Later, she went to the computer and watched a snippet of a horror movie on YouTube. Sixteen Ghosts, it was called. But even that wasn't enough to squelch the knotted feeling in Anzu's stomach or get Reika's voice out of her head. After that, Anzu buried her face into her bed.

What Anzu didn't know was that Reika stood in front of her bedroom door, clutching the clay bowl tightly, with a nervous look on her face. Her fingers pressed against the bowl so tightly that the tips turned red. _'Come on, Reika. You can do it. You can't keep acting like this anymore. You need to understand Anzu better. Understand her need to watch horror movies, wear black clothes, and hang out with odd friends. It doesn't make Anzu bad. It's your job as a mother to be there for your daughter! Go on! It's not that hard!'_ Reika kept telling herself to knock on her door, but she couldn't even raise her hand up to knock.

Reika didn't know what was controlling her, what was stopping her from knocking on Anzu's door. She had met many parents who praised their kids up the wazoo, even though they had some problems and setbacks, and their kids were nothing like what she wanted Anzu to be.

_"I never would have known so much about furries if it hadn't been for my daughter. She taught me a lot."_

_"I'm proud to have my daughter in my life. She's autistic. Raising her has opened my eyes to many new things, and it makes me happy to see her happy."_

_"My son married his boyfriend recently. They're so cute together! Their wedding was so sweet! His husband is a real keeper."_

_"My daughter just published a book recently. It's called Magical Lovers ~Entwined Hearts~, and it's about a male to female transgender girl and her friend who become a team of magical girls and save the world from monsters all while trying to live their own lives. It's so good! Reading it made me teary-eyed! I'm already going around recommending it to all my friends and their kids!"_

_"My son stood up to a bully for picking on his autistic sister. I'm so proud of him! More people should follow his example!"_

Reika couldn't understand how they could all be so open and accepting of their children's imperfections. As far as Reika knew, her family openly wanted her to be what they perceived to be a perfect child: a cute and kind proper lady who didn't have any abnormalities, always followed the norm, always polite, and carried on her family's wishes and reputation. This was what Japanese men wanted back in her day, and if she didn't make herself educated or proper, her chances of getting a husband amounted to zilch.

Have Japan's values and ideals really changed over the years? Reika had noticed a startling amount of people who let their kids wear goth clothes, cosplay as cartoon characters for fun, or even have their kids in wheelchairs go outside like they were like everyone else. It made Reika think a little bit.

She remembered the phone call with her mother.

_"Reika. I think you should stop trying so hard to turn Anzu into your perfect child. I made that mistake with you and I hate myself for it. The world is changing, Reika. We're in the modern age now, and there isn't much we can do but accept it and open our minds and hearts to it. Instead of trying to change Anzu into something she's not, try to...accept her as she is. I didn't do that with you, and I should have. There's a lot you can learn from seeing different things. I've learned many new things, and I couldn't be happier. Perhaps it's about time you open your heart and try to understand Anzu and why she's the way she is."_

* * *

"Is it just me, or has An-chan been absent from school for three days straight already?" Riko asked one day.

"I know, right? I tried calling her but I didn't get an answer. Her cell phone's off, and she isn't answering her home phone either," Marina said, her usually sullen face and golden eyes donning a worried look. Even Marina found her own worry to be unusual, as she never acted worried unless her mother was involved.

"She has been throwing up a lot, right? She must be so sick she can't come to school," Fukiko piped in worriedly. "My dad's a school nurse at the elementary school, and he told me once that if you vomit too much, your esophagus can get damaged, your gums get their tissue ripped off, and the enamel in your teeth gets destroyed. It's pretty disgusting."

"That can happen?" Riko asked, confused.

"Only if you puke way too much, like, I dunno, thirty or forty times a day?" Marina clarified.

It hit Riko right there. Anzu had been throwing up a lot. Much more so than humanly possible. She made a mental note to ask Starbeam to go to her house and check her out when she gets home. If Anzu had been puking more times than she should, then she must be really sick. She wished there was some way she could help.

"Man, I'm so glad Goth Girl isn't here today!" Toshiko suddenly exclaimed out of nowhere as she looked at a brand new bottle of nail polish she bought recently.

Yoshie combed some knots out of her pigtails with her fingers. "I know, right? She reeks of puke! I don't want to be caught DEAD near her! She might be contagious!"

"She should be expelled for making the school and everybody around her smell like vomit," Shizuka piped in, causing Yoshie and Toshiko to laugh.

"Better yet, she should choke on it!" Yoshie piped in.

A nerve within Riko's system snapped in half. How dare they talk about Anzu like that! With gusto, she stomped over to the catty clique of girls and stamped her foot to get their attention. They turned their heads to find Riko standing before their desks.

Yoshie glared at her with confusion and scorn. "What do you want?" Yoshie asked condescendingly.

Riko didn't take her eyes off them. "Is there anyone in this world you DON'T talk bad about or make up a bunch of lies about?!"

"What's it to you, freak!" Shizuka snapped.

"It's not like An-chan WANTS to throw up a lot or does it to annoy you! It's a bodily reaction! Everybody does it some time when they're sick! I'll bet you've done it, too!" Riko snapped back.

"Well, I don't do it nearly five or ten times a day! AND I don't make everyone smell bad too!" Yoshie retorted.

"Oooh! Burn!" Toshiko piped in.

"Besides, if you were actually normal, you'd be way better off with us instead of that goth girl who cuts her wrists with razors! That's what all emo people do!" Yoshie snapped.

"An-chan's not like that and you know it! At least she doesn't talk bad about people and spread stupid lies around!" Riko snapped back.

"Cut it out, girls," Mrs. Omori told them calmly but sternly. She then turned to Yoshie. "Inoue. We do not call names in this school, nor do we belittle people for their faults. If I catch you doing that again, you're getting detention with me for three weeks! And Riko, please use your inside voice when in the classroom."

The clique of girls looked at each other with worried faces. Knowing it was futile to argue with Mrs. Omori, they conceded defeat, sat down at their desks, and kept their mouths shut.

Riko wasted no time getting back in her own seat as well. "You were awesome back there, Riko!" Kyoya exalted her with a light pat on the back.

"Hardly anyone stands up to them like that," Fukiko said. "I couldn't do it if my life depended on it."

"All I did was tell her she shouldn't talk bad about people and spread lies about them," Riko said.

Marina flashed a thumb's up.

"Oh! Riko! Here's your book back," Kyoya said as he pulled out a Moomin book and handed it back to Riko. "I totally see why you like it now! You got me hooked!"

"REALLY?!" Riko suddenly yelped out of nowhere, prompting Mrs. Omori to go "Shh!" Her face red with embarrassment, she slumped back into her seat.

As embarrassing as it was, Riko didn't let their treachery and closed-mindedness deter her. At recess, the only thing she and Kyoya talked about were Moomins, and Riko was nothing short of elated to finally be able to talk to someone about her favorite children's series. She never expected him to like it, but he did, and that was enough to make Riko happier than an angel. Riko knew she found a kindred spirit the minute they bonded over _Hinata Sun Child_ last month. Now, Riko was completely sure that Kyoya was the one kindred spirit and friend she had been dying to have for all the years she's lived.

"Umm...exactly what's Hinata Sun Child about, anyway?" Fukiko asked out of the blue. Riko stopped talking upon hearing this from Fukiko of all people, finding herself confused.

"Why do you want to know? You don't like manga," Riko asked, flummoxed.

"There are some that I read, like _Renai Romance_ and _Dai Dai Daisuki Daisuke_," Fukiko piped in with a soft smile. "Tell me about it. I wouldn't mind checking it out."

"You won't like it. It's about an autistic girl who's a princess whose kingdom is taken over by an evil spirit, and she and some friends from school and her pet unicorn pegasus have to find some magic artifacts to stop him from doing worse things to the world, like erasing the sun and moon. But then she finds out her sister who always wants her to be perfect and not weird is the one that unleashed the evil spirit out of jealousy and lots of cool but dark stuff happens," Riko explained.

"Riko and I both have all nine volumes so far. I hear it's supposed to end at volume 12. I can lend you some of my copies if you like," Kyoya suggested.

"Thanks," Fukiko said with a blush. "I'd like that." Marina flashed a sweet smile upon seeing this.

But Riko's expression still looked a bit guarded and dubious. Why would someone like Fukiko want to check out a fantastical, whimsical, sometimes dark, sometimes sweet, out of this world manga like Hinata Sun Child? It was practically out of her league, and Riko knew that _Renai Romance and Dai Dai Daisuki Daisuke_ were both cheesy, romance and melodrama filled shojo mangas. She liked _Dai Dai Daisuki Daisuke_ (but not to the extent she likes Hinata Sun Child), but she couldn't get into _Renai Romance_ if she tried. The premise was contrived, the characters always acted stupid and wouldn't talk to each other when drama sparked, the love triangle was too complicated for her to wrap her head around, and the overly glitzy and shojo-y art style just made her feel like she had eye problems.

After recess, the school day went by just fine. But before the bell rang for everyone to go home, they agreed to send one of the fairies out to Anzu's house to see how she's doing, and they'll call if they find out anything. When Riko arrived home, the first thing she did was ask Starbeam to go to Anzu's house to check on her.

"How come? Is something amiss?" Starbeam asked, pulling her head out of Riko's rather large, heavy, and thick copy of _Shine The Light: Loving An Autistic Child_ volume one by Kobe Seiko.

"An-chan hasn't been to school in the last three days, and from what I hear she's gotten sick a lot. We tried calling her but she hasn't been answering. I'm worried. Would it be okay if you flew to her house and paid her a visit? Just to see if she's okay? If you don't want to, that's fine," Riko replied and asked the question as politely as she could.

Starbeam put a book mark in the book and shut it. "Not a problem at all. I'd be more than happy to fly over there and pay her a visit. I'd best get to it. I'll be back soon and report if anything is amiss," Starbeam flew out of Riko's window.

"Thanks!" Riko shouted before Starbeam got out of sight. She did look down at her feet with a bit of rue creeping into her heart. _'I'd visit her myself, but I don't think Mom'll let me, and I have my math test to study for,'_ Riko thought as she sat down to go over her math notes in preparation for her upcoming math test.

As for Starbeam, she knew the area where Anzu's house was well. She had been there lots of times before when searching for Lovebeam. She made sure to fly at a high enough distance from the ground so in case people saw her, they'd assume she was a bird, but low enough so she'd be able to figure out which house is Anzu's.

However, she did take a liking to Hikaribashi's many trees, the city's overall cleanliness, the cute little animals like rabbits and squirrels scuttling around all over the place at their heart's content. In a way, it reminded her of Rozaniela, where she would always see animals running around, birds flying and singing their songs, people taking time to clean up trash and keep the meadows and forests and towns clean, all those things.

Unfortunately for Starbeam, those happy thoughts ceased as soon as she saw Anzu's house within her vicinity. But it wasn't Anzu's house that suddenly caused her to become worried. What made Starbeam stop in mid-air is the sight of a large, white truck with a glowing red light on it, with the words _Shining Light Hospital_ painted on the side in black.

An ambulance.

A red flag sprung up in Starbeam's head the minute she discerned the vehicle. If an ambulance was here, then something must be wrong. Horribly wrong. With worry springing in her heart like a newly blossoming plant, Starbeam flitted to the side of the house to find a window, making sure passing paramedics didn't spot her. When she found a window, she peered into it to find a sight she wished she didn't have to see.

Anzu was lying on a stretcher, unconscious, with a small trail of vomit trickling down her cheek and onto her chin. Her ponytail had been undone. A slew of frantic and frazzled paramedics are hooking her up to various machines, like a portable oxygen mask and a blood pressure monitor. Junnosuke was on his knees, sobbing loudly and uncontrollably for all to hear, yelling something like "Please! Save my Anzu! Don't let her die! She's all I have!" Reika sat next to him with both hands on his shoulders, trying to keep it together for his sake but failing to do so.

Starbeam looked away. She pulled a notebook and pen out of the star shaped clip on her bow and wrote down the name of the hospital that was on the ambulance. Shining Light Hospital. Once she finished and put them away, she immediately dashed away from the house, flying back to Riko's house as fast as she could.

Riko was right to be worried about Anzu, and in her heart, Starbeam was glad she suggested that she go check on her today, serious and dire as this situation is. However, even though she managed to get far enough away, the ghostly sound of the sirens resounded throughout the air.

Finally, she made it back to Riko's house. She flitted through the opening in the window and hopped so hard into Riko's room that she made the girl yelp in fright. "Whoa! Starbeam! You scared the living daylights outta me!"

"Riko-chan! It's terrible! Absolutely terrible!" Starbeam exclaimed worriedly, her face dripping with beads of sweat. She tried to speak, but Riko could tell she was so frazzled and worked up that she couldn't construct a coherent sentence.

"Calm down. What happened?" Riko told her. Although she looked curious, in the girl's heart, a seed of worry began to blossom at an alarming rate. If Starbeam was this worried and frazzled, then something must be wrong.

Really wrong.

"I journeyed to Anzu's house like you asked of me. But when I got there...I saw an ambulance!" Starbeam blurted out finally.

"An...ambulance?" Riko muttered softly at first. An ambulance? Her first thought was this: _'Something bad happened to An-chan? Is she sick? Is she hurt?'_ The first thing she could blurt out was this: "Tell me you wrote down the name of the hospital!" She shouted.

"That, I did!" Starbeam pulled out her little notebook and handed it to Riko. The worried girl looked at the name of the hospital, handed the notebook back to Starbeam, and dashed for the phone. She wasted absolutely no time calling every single one of her friends and telling them everything in the loudest voice she can muster. She's so loud it wound up drawing Arinao into the room once she finished talking to Kyoya.

"Riko? What's all the commotion? You might want to-" Arinao was about to talk to her until Riko cut him off.

"We need to go to Shining Light Hospital!" She shouted even louder this time, confusing Arinao even more.

"A hospital?"

"YES! We need to go there NOW! An-chan's sick! Mari-chan told me she saw an ambulance in front of her house and-and-and-and An-chan being put on a..a...a stretcher thingy!"

"Calm down, Riko," Arinao told her as calmly as he could manage.

"NO! Come on! We gotta go NOW!" Riko grabbed his arm and tried to drag him out, but he pulled himself out.

"Let me get my keys and my shoes on first, Riko," Arinao told her calmly before leaving to get his car keys and his shoes. Riko's shouting pulled Saki and Hikage into the kitchen.

"What's all the hubbub?" Hikage asked, confusedly.

"HURRY UP DAD!"

"Riko! Use your inside voice," Saki told her in a hushed tone, but Riko paid her mother absolutely no heed. Starbeam slipped into Riko's pocket. Soon, Arinao clopped down the stairs.

"Riko and I have to go somewhere, Saki. We'll be back when we can," Arinao told her.

"But dinner's almost ready," Saki said, confused.

"Sorry about that. Riko's friend is in the hospital and she wants to check on her," Arinao explained.

"Come on come on come on come on!" Riko wasted no time dragging her father out of the house by the arm, even though he's quite heavy.

"We'll save you some dinner, okay?" Hikage said to them, but Riko didn't hear him, as she's too wound up about Anzu to think about anything else. Or hear anything that's being said to her.

"I'll call you when we're on our way home. Okay?" Arinao said before closing the door.

As flabbergasted and confused as he was, Arinao wasted no time starting the car and driving for this _Shining Light Hospital_, with Riko furiously bouncing in the back seat. He certainly didn't plan on any of this, but somewhere, in the depths of his heart, a flicker of happiness sparked in his fatherly soul.

This was the first time Riko had ever been so furiously compassionate for a friend's welfare, especially since she never had a friend before coming to this town. No, he always knew Riko was compassionate in her own way, but not once did he ever think he would see the day where his own daughter would yell at the top of her lungs and drag him out of the house to go to a hospital just because she was worried about someone she cares about.

It made him proud to be her father. She had come a long way since her early days.

The parking lot of the hospital wasn't as packed as Arinao thought it'd be, as there were quite a few spots to pick from. Arinao and Riko pulled into one and they walked into the large hospital. As soon as she put one foot into the waiting room, Riko covered her ears and kneeled to the floor because the sound of a wailing baby assaulted her ear drums.

But despite this, Riko stood back up and walked to the reception desk. "Hi! I'm looking for Chino Anzu. I heard she was taken here," Riko said to the receptionist as Arinao flanked her from behind.

"Are you family?" The woman asked.

"No, but she's my best friend," Riko told her with no minced words.

"I see. The doctors are checking her out right now, so you'd best have a seat," The woman said.

"Hey! Riko!" Marina's voice caught Riko's attention as she turned around to find Marina and Hotaru, along with Moonbeam, Sunbeam, and Lovebeam.

"You got here fast," Riko said.

"We agreed to transform into Pretty Cure for a bit so we could all fly here," Hotaru replied in a low whisper so nobody around them would hear.

Riko was about to say something like, _'Why didn't I think of that?'_ but she figured out that if she were absent from the house for an unprecedented amount of time, Arinao and Saki would find out and get worried.

Reika buried her face into her hands. _'Oh God oh God oh God oh God! Please, lord! Don't take my daughter away! She's all I have!'_ Reika shook her head and hands violently, praying as hard as she could that the doctors save Anzu. Reika had only just gotten to know Anzu a little bit in the three days they spent together.

Reika couldn't lose her only daughter. Reika didn't know what she'd do if the worst came to pass.

"So...what happened to An-chan? Is she sick?" Riko asked Junnosuke worriedly.

"I'm afraid so. She stayed home the past few days because she got a little sick. We were going to watch some Doctor Who episodes together until she collapsed in the living room, choking on her vomit," Junnosuke told her with a voice completely consumed with worry.

"Gross," Lovebeam whispered.

After that, all everyone could do was wait. Riko didn't mind waiting so much, but what she did mind was that crying baby that had been wailing ever since she came in, and hadn't stopped. Riko kept her ears covered. Marina, who was normally averse to Riko's odd behaviors, didn't say a word, also finding the baby's incessant crying to be annoying on her ears. Finally, the mother with the bawling baby in her arms got escorted to another room, probably to have her baby checked out. Riko finally uncovered her ears.

Soon, a doctor approached Juunosuke and Reika. "Are you the Chino family?"

With wide, tired eyes, Reika stood up in alarm. "How's Anzu!? Is she okay!?" Junnosuke stood up soon after.

The doctor smiled. "She's alright. What happened was that some chunks of food she swallowed didn't get digested yet, and as it was about to be forced out, it got caught in her airway, causing her to choke. She collapsed from dehydration, so we have her hooked up to an IV."

Juunosuke exhaled a huge sigh of relief and fell to his knees with a huge, unmistakable smile on his face. "Ohhh, thank God!" The girls rejoiced loudly. Riko couldn't resist the urge to squeal and jump up and down, much to the surprise of some onlookers. Marina was so happy she didn't bother to facepalm or scold her. Not even Reika made a huge issue of it. She was too happy about Anzu to care about Riko's outburst.

"We're lucky we managed to save her before things got bad. However, I should let you know that her teeth are starting to show signs of acid erosion. It's when the teeth lose their enamel caused by too much exposure to acid. I recommend you get her to a dentist soon, because if she keeps vomiting the way she does, her teeth will be discolored and lose their strength," The doctor said.

"Yes. I'll work on that. But can we see her?" Juunosuke said.

"Of course. She's in the recovery room. I'll take you there," The doctor said before taking everyone to the recovery room. They arrived within a few minutes, and they found Anzu sitting in a bed in one part of the recovery room obscured by blue curtains. She's wearing a blue and white hospital gown, with her long, blonde hair down, her glasses still covering her swollen lime green eyes, and protruding from one of her arms is an IV tube, connected to a bag hanging from a steel hanger.

"An-chan! You're okay!" Riko was the first to run to her side and trap her in a hug.

"Riko. Give her some space, dear," Arinao told her.

"It's fine, Tasogare-san. In fact, I really need a hug right now," Anzu told him, her voice breaking a little as she relished in her best friend's warm, tight, loving hug. Her head pulsated a little bit, but Riko's hug made Anzu feel secure.

"Anzu...I'm so glad you're okay…" Juunosuke sniveled as more tears trailed down from his eyes.

"Me too, Dad," Anzu muttered softly as Riko released her.

"We came here as soon as we heard the news," Hotaru told her. The fairies popped out and huddled against the blonde, bespectacled girl, taking care not to be noticed by Arinao, Juunosuke, Reika, and the doctor. Anzu felt their fluffy bodies rub against her arm, which told her that they're there for her right now. She stroke all of their heads in appreciation, happy that they were offering her their own support.

"We heard you choked on your puke," Riko said.

"Is that what happened?" Anzu asked, her voice croaking a bit. She looked down at the blanket her legs were resting under with a sad face. "I see…"

"Anzu...this may be rude of us to ask, but...how come it got this bad?" Hotaru asked politely.

Reika glanced at her scornfully. "Who are you?"

Hotaru blinked. "Uhh...who are you?"

Riko pointed it out. "This is Anzu's mother."

Hotaru bowed politely. "Oh. Hello there."

"Why are you all even here? This is our private family matters," Reika said, crossing her arms. "Anzu needs her space. You're scaring her."

"Mom. It's fine. I want them to be here," Anzu told her. "They're my friends."

"If they were your friends, they'd leave you alone and-"

"STOP!"

Anzu's shouting was enough to make Reika zip her lip. Riko covered her ears. Everyone was speechless. Even Junnosuke. Anzu's voice was raspy from the vomiting, but she didn't care. "Mom. You better listen, and listen good," Anzu began, not taking her eyes off of Reika. "I'm sick of you always crusading to protect me from everything. Movies, video games, friends...you just want me all to yourself, don't you?!"

Reika's eyes widened, looking like she had seen a ghost. "Anzu! Everything I've done was for your own good!"

That just added more fuel to the fire. It was so irritating to listen to someone make up excuses to convince themselves that hurting their kids psychologically was justified.

It was here that Arinao and the other kids left. But they could still hear the yelling. Riko could, thanks to her hypersensitive hearing. More than that, she wanted to hear this. She wanted to hear Anzu tear her mother apart.

And that's exactly what she did.

"It wasn't for my own good! You just wanted to make yourself look and feel good! Don't think I don't know what you're really like, Mom!"

"Anzu! If you keep doing all these weird things, watching horror movies, wearing all black, and playing violent video games, you're going to grow up without a future!"

"Has doing all that stuff turned me into a psycho killer who hurts people? Do you see me going around hurting people? No! No, you don't! Movies and games don't do that, Mom! Why don't you get that?! Look at what I've accomplished! I have friends who like me for me! I'm getting good grades in school! I was even voted student of the month one year!" Reika shuddered. "I'm actually HAPPY! But you're miserable!"

Anzu balled her fists. She was on a roll. "You don't like it when I'm happy, do you? You weren't happy when I made my first friends! You weren't happy when I told you I wanted to be a theater actress! You weren't happy when I aced a bunch of tests! If you really were my mother and really did love me, you would be happy for me! But you're not, are you? All you care about is how I look, how I dress, and how my bad behavior is gonna make me turn into a bad person, which I'm not! I'm not going to play this game anymore with you, Mom!"

Anzu looked into her mother's eyes. Something was odd. Reika wasn't angry. She wasn't surprised anymore. She looked just like Anzu did when Reika would scold her: small, scared, and wretched.

"Mom. You know I love you. I really do. But stop treating me like I'm some...well, fancy glass item you have to protect from everything! I love my friends! I don't care if they're different. They like me, and I like them! They've been there for me when I needed them. I only wish..." Anzu's voice trailed off for a moment. "...You'd love me for me."

Reika didn't know what to say. But she knew this for sure: Anzu was right. About everything. Reika looked down into her purse. A piece of the bowl poked out from between her wallet and check book. She looked at it before sitting down. After that, she buried her face in her hands and cried softly.

"Wow. Did you hear all that?" Riko asked.

Marina, Kyoya, and the fairies nodded. "It's rude to eavesdrop. You'll get in trouble if you stay there," Hotaru advised, but they ignored her.

"Man, she was awesome," Marina whispered. "She totally told her off like a boss!"

"I know, right?" Sunbeam added.

"I don't know. I actually feel a little bad for Reika-san," Starbeam said.

With that, happy that Anzu was okay, everyone sans the Chino family went home to get some dinner.

* * *

Zenjin stared down at a book with lots of hiragana and kanji, looking like he was concentrating really hard, with Beileag watching him just a couple feet away. There was a huge pile of crumpled up papers next to him, with lots of katakana and hiragana on the sides, but with lots of odd, inaccurate scribbles on the other sides.

The symbols for _'he'_ were written backwards, the hiragana for _'n'_ wasn't shaped like a lower case h and was instead shaped like an incomplete trapezoid, the hiragana symbol for _'a'_ didn't have the loop on the bottom of it, but on the top instead, and the kanji for _'guchi'_, instead of being a plain square was a very blocky and cock-eyed triangle, among many mistakes. Suddenly, Zenjin let out a loud growl and threw the soft book at Beileag.

"Ow! Watch it, Zen-chan! That hurt!" Beileag complained as she threw the book back at him. Zenjin caught it, so it didn't hit him.

"I don't know how you people can read this stuff!" Zenjin yelled, throwing the book on the floor.

"Can you really not read even basic katakana?" Decebal asked as he worked on his nails.

"Yeah! How come everyone else can read and I can't?! Everything looks like little fuzzy black balls to me!" Zenjin growled, stamping his feet even though he's sitting on a cushion.

"Did you try wishing on the Energia to be able to read and write?" Decebal asked as he went to get a hair brush.

"I did that. It didn't work," Zenjin confessed in a softer voice this time. Beileag sat on a bean bag chair, looking in a compact mirror as she examined the new cotton candy pink lace ribbons she put on her indigo colored pigtails.

"Maybe you have some kind of learning disability. Lots of people have those," Beileag said. "I remember one classmate of mine couldn't read or write, but she got lots of help."

"Boo! I'm not like that!" Zenjin snapped. "But then again, that fat woman did always beat me and yell at me, even for not being able to read and write. She said stuff like, _'Why can't you do something as simple as read or write?! Every person on this planet can do it, you trash!'_ Oh, how I wished I could crack face open," Zenjin confessed darkly as he took a piece of strawberry pocky from a box and began chomping on it. "Hey, Decebal."

"Hm?"

"I need to check my complexion," Beileag said as she went into her room, ignoring the conversation.

"When you rescued me, did you ever arrest her? Or did you give her over to the police?" Zenjin asked in a soft voice.

"We didn't have time to deal with her. Our only priority was getting you out of there," Decebal told him as he put his gloves back on. "Plus, someone would arrest her eventually. Since she was a woman of violent moods, I figured she might lose her mind and lash out, and that easily grabs the attention of the public eye."

Zenjin flashed a mischievous smile and a thumb's up. "Good one. But then again, I do kinda wish she had been. That way, she'd be in one place and you'd be able to find her easily. Speaking of, did you or Beileag ever find the school I went to yet?"

"I'm afraid not, Zenny boy. The fact that it's by the ocean isn't enough to go by. But you did say you've been there for a short while, so I guess-"

"YEEEEEEEK!" Beileag's bloodcurdling scream echoed throughout the fortress. Zenjin and Decebal didn't bother to go in her room and see what's wrong. Instead, Zenjin just facepalmed and Decebal began polishing one of his fancy shoes with a wash cloth. Soon, Beileag darted out of the room, her pale lavender eyes wide like saucers, her face beet red and ready to explode.

"What's your major malfunction?" Zenjin asked irritably, in no mood to deal with whatever it is his adoptive mother is shouting about.

"I HAVE A ZIIIIIIT!" Beileag screamed to the world like her life was in danger, pointing to a swollen red pimple on her right cheek.

"So? Why should we care?" Zenjin asked as he chewed on some more strawberry pink pocky.

"Don't you get it?! Pimples ruin my beautiful complexion! If I get more, my beautiful face will be covered with acne, and nobody will want to cast a person with a face full of zits and acne as the leading lady for a play!" Beileag whined like an annoying teenage girl, unabashedly pointing to her swollen pimple. "Did you know that pimples are caused by oil getting trapped in the pores of people's skin?! I gotta go to Earth and get some makeup products to hide iiiiiiiit!"

"Get over it, you whiny ditz. Nobody cares about the ugly zit on your trashy face," Zenjin sneered before eating yet another stick of pocky. "It's not like anything you do will make them go away, and even if you do make that one go away, more are just gonna pop up anyway!"

"Not if Billie has anything to say about it!" Beileag yelped angrily as she darted out of the fortress.

"Don't worry. You won't," Zenjin mused to himself right after she left. "Beileag's so dumb. Always freaking out over stupid stuff."

"She has her moments. I dearly hope she scrapes together some information while she's at it," Decebal said as he went into the bathroom.

"You know she won't. She's just gonna go shopping for useless stuff like she always does. If I see more dresses in those shopping bags, I'm gonna blast her trash into oblivion!"

"Suit yourself, Zenny boy."

"By the way, how come you guys are able to expose people's Soul Portals when you don't even have the Energia?"

"It's probably because we were exposed to its energy when we first came into contact with it, improving our powers somewhat. But I don't quite know for sure."

Zenjin pulled out the last piece of pocky and ate it, leaving a tiny box the size of his whole hand completely empty.

* * *

The hospital discharged Anzu a few hours after she got admitted, so she was free to return home, on the condition that she use an enamel strengthening toothpaste to brush her teeth with from now on so the acid erosion caused by her vomit won't destroy her teeth completely. She also got prescribed some medicine to help keep her food down when she eats. Everyone went home. Anzu sat in the back seat of the car with Sunbeam tucked snugly in her hands as her father drove from the hospital.

Junnosuke and Reika were silent for a while. The tension between them was tense, but Anzu noticed that they didn't glare at each other. "I'm glad you're alright, Anzu," Reika said.

Anzu smiled. "Me too."

"When we get home, I'll make some hayashi rice for dinner. Is that okay?" Junnosuke asked.

Both Anzu and Reika nodded. "Hayashi rice is one of my favorites," Reika said with a smile. "My mother would always scold my brother for only eating the rice portions and not the vegetables."

Junnosuke smiled sweetly. "That must have sucked. I remember when-WHOA!" Juunosuke was about to tell her a story of his own until the car suddenly stopped in its tracks.

"What's up?" Anzu asked.

"I feel Beileag's presence!" Sunbeam whispered.

"Did I get a flat?" Juunosuke got out of the car and examined his tires. But none of them were flat. There weren't any marks on them or anything. Anzu got out with Sunbeam in her hands, but when she looked up, she saw Beileag floating in the air with a disappointed look on her face.

"I need to let off some steam, and you're gonna be my outlet, Cure Dawn!" Beileag yelled as she threw a purple ball of energy. It was about to hit Anzu, but Sunbeam flew in front of her and deflected it with a yellow shield, sending it right back at Beileag. It didn't knock her to the street, but her indigo pigtails stood up into the air, defying gravity.

"What in the world?! That woman is floating!" Reika shouted, her eyes wide with shock.

"Uuuuuugh! Now you're gonna get it!" Anzu tried to run, but Beileag was on her tail, ready to shoot another ball of light at her. Suddenly…

"ANZU!" Juunosuke pushed her out of the way, sending her rolling on the concrete as cars stopped to observe the scene with awe. Juunosuke cried out in pain as he was hit with the ball of energy, his Soul Portal being exposed for all to see...and for Beileag to stick her head into. She did just that, and Juunosuke wailed in pain as Beileag attempted to rip his soul out.

Reika fell to her knees in horror. "Junnosuke!"

"DAD!" Anzu screamed as she ran toward the hippie woman and rammed into her, pushing her off of her helpless father. She didn't get to rip his soul out, so she came out empty. "Leave my dad alone, you hippie!"

"Out of my way, Cure Dawn!" Beileag yelled.

'_Cure Dawn? What is she talking about?! That hippie talks like she knows Anzu! And what's with this gigantic mirror?!'_ Juunosuke asked frightfully as he tried to get back on his feet, struggling to straighten itself out and figure out what was going on around him.

"Anzu! Get out of there! Go get help! It's dangerous!" Reika yelled, trying to get back on her feet. But one of the heels on her shoes popped off, and she was sent spiraling to the ground with a yelp.

Anzu pulled out her Heart Lighter and gripped it tightly. She was standing right in front of her frightened parents, with Sunbeam next to her, floating in mid-air. _'If I transform in front of them, they'll know I'm a Pretty Cure. But Beileag's gonna rip Dad's soul out, and I can't let that happen!'_ Anzu closed her eyes and grimaced. _'I'm sorry, Mom and Dad! But I have to!'_ She readied her Heart Lighter. "Pretty Cure, let the light shine!"

Juunosuke and many onlookers watched in awe as Anzu was bathed in a golden light, coming out dressed in a different outfit. "I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

They couldn't believe their eyes. Then again, they definitely recognized her eyes, glasses, and ponytail. There's no mistaking those. _'Anzu...what is this? Did you just...turn into some...super hero?' _Juunosuke stammered in his head.

"What is the meaning of this?! Anzu! You have some explaining to do!" Reika shouted.

"Everyone! Please get away from here or you'll be killed!" Cure Dawn commanded. Some people immediately evacuated without a second thought. Juunosuke was so frozen with a combination of surprise and fear that he couldn't move from where he was. Reika tried to pick him up, but he just wouldn't move.

"You, like, totally need a head-to-toe makeover!" Beileag was about to land one of her high heels on Cure Dawn, but she grabbed her leg with one hand and threw her on top of someone's car. None of the windows broke and no part of the car sustained any dents. She tried to fly toward Cure Dawn, but the latter intercepted her.

She tried to land some punches and kicks on her, but Beileag kept evading them, even catching her hand at one point and throwing her onto someone's car, breaking the windshield. Sunbeam flew away from the scene, probably to let the others know what was happening. Cure Dawn yanked out her nunchucks and threw herself at Beileag, who proceeded to throw a purple ball of energy at her.

"Dawn Spin!" Cure Dawn spun her nunchucks in a circle which caused the beam of energy to disappear. "Dawn Flame!" She then used them to shoot a burst of blazing yellow flames at the hippie, who brushed them all away with a wave of her hand emitting purple energy.

"Think you can leave some third degree burns on me, princess? Think again!" Beileag hissed as she rammed herself into Cure Dawn, knocking her to someone's car. Beileag raised a glowing hand, ready to pummel her into oblivion...

"GET AWAY FROM MY DAUGHTER!"

Reika rammed into Beileag with the force of a football player. She had taken off both her high heels. As soon as Beileag made eye contact with Reika, her anger only boiled. "Fine! You'll be my outlet!"

"If you hurt one hair on my daughter, I'll-" Before Reika could finish, a purple sphere of energy sent her to the ground, exposing her Soul Portal. Beileag was quick to dunk her head into it.

"MOM! NO! Dawn Sunny Whip!" Cure Dawn pulled out a glowing yellow rope and tried to smack Beileag with it, but the hippie was successful in yanking out her mother's soul and corrupting it. The black orb morphed into a black grizzly bear with glowing red eyes. It wasted no time stomping on cars within its vicinity, turning them into squashed heaps of metal and broken glass as it walked away.

"_I'm a terrible parent!"_ The black grizzly bear bellowed sadly as it knocked over a tree which fell on someone's house, making a huge hole in the roof.

Cure Dawn balled her fists. "Forgive me, Mom," She then flew toward the giant bear, spun around in the air, and landed a massive rolling kick on its head. But it didn't knock it out. Instead, it took one of its paws and tried to swat her. Cure Dawn set up a shield just in time, but she still got knocked into a tree. Thankfully, she got right back up and attempted a Golden Dawn Explosion on it. Unfortunately for Anzu, it wasn't enough to purify it.

_"I can't understand my daughter for the life of me! I can't accept her for who she is, even though I want to! I want to be her mother, but I ruined everything!"_ The grizzly bear yelled as it swatted a house, breaking some windows. Cure Dawn delivered another roundabout kick on it, but this time, the bear swatted her again, and she didn't have time to set up her shield. It didn't help that her eyesight was blurring a bit and her head was throbbing.

"No...I have to...my mom…" Cure Dawn struggled to get back on her feet, but found that the energy in her body was seeping right out of her. But before the giant black grizzly bear could do anything else…

"Twilight Serenade!"

"Starlight Shower!"

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!"

The attacks of Cures Twilight, Starlight, and Dusk, along with energy beams fired by the four fairy sisters, bombarded the grizzly bear, causing it to growl in pain. Soon, the trio of Pretty Cure and the fairy quartet appeared in front of their exhausted comrade, helping her up. "How'd you get here so fast?"

"Sunbeam told us everything. Plus we could hear the commotion nearby," Cure Starlight said. The sky turned mandarin orange, just like Cure Dusk's outfit, with the golden sun hiding behind the horizon, ready to go to sleep.

"That Corrupt Sentinel...it's my mom. I have to save her. I need to-" Cure Dawn croaked weakly and was about to walk away until Cure Twilight grabbed her hand.

"Do you really think you can do this alone?" Cure Twilight told her with concern.

"It's okay to ask us for help once in a while!" Cure Dusk exclaimed boldly with her arms crossed.

"Besides, we still have time!" Starbeam interjected.

Cure Dawn smiled. She then looked down and noticed that a clay bowl was sitting on the road. A flood of memories drowned her mind. That was the bowl she made in kindergarten for Reika. Reika was so happy when she received it, she was crying. Anzu had never seen that side of Reika before, but it made her happy. _'Mom actually kept that all this time?'_ If Reika didn't love her, she would have thrown it away, calling it trash.

The fact that she kept it showed that in her own way, Reika did love Anzu.

Nobody was going to change that, especially now that her friends are here to help.

With that, all four girls landed some good punches and kicks on the giant grizzly bear, taking care not to cause it to fall on any houses. When it was distracted enough, they initiated the finishing move.

"Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!" With that, the bear disappeared, revealing Juunosuke's soul orb. Cure Dawn wasted no time taking it and putting it back in her father's Soul Portal.

"Thanks for coming, girls. I couldn't have done it without you," Cure Dawn said sheepishly, pushing one of her hands through her thick blonde hair.

"You're welcome. I was afraid you'd get sick again and you'd collapse from pushing yourself too hard," Cure Twilight confessed.

Beileag was at her wit's end. "Urrrrgh! Why do you stupid Pretty Cure always get in the way of my beloved Decebal and Zenjin's plans?! Don't you have better things to do?! Like, oh, I don't know, go to fashion clubs and get head-to-toe makeovers?! You won't get anywhere in life if you look and act the way you do! Nobody cares about a bunch of yard sale rejects!"

"Do we look like we care?" Cure Dusk added as she readied her bow and arrow. "By the way, you have a humongous zit on your face."

Upon hearing this, Beileag pulled out her compact mirror. She screamed like she saw a horror movie. "IT GOT BIGGER!" She screeched and threw some energy beams around. "I need masking products! Where are the makeup stores?! I need something to hide this huge blemiiiiiiiish!" With that, she disappeared just as the sky began to develop splotches of purple and blue on its orange coat.

Turning back to normal, Anzu and Junnosuke ran over to her unconscious mother with worry. Thankfully for her, he woke up. "Anzu...you're a magical girl hero…" She muttered weakly.

"Wait, what?!" Cure Twilight yelped. "Tell me they didn't figure out who you are!"

"Now you know, huh?" Anzu confessed softly.

Cure Dusk groaned and facepalmed. "Are you kidding me?!"

"How long…?" Juunosuke asked as Reika came to.

"For about a month. Sorry I didn't tell you. I was afraid you'd get mad," Anzu said.

Juunosuke smiled and rubbed his daughter's head of hair. "Now why would I be mad? I saw the stories about the monsters on the news. I even saw some monsters, so I know those were real. But...now that I know you're fighting them...to tell you the truth, I really fear for your life. I want to protect you and keep you away from those things. I don't...want to lose you…" Juunosuke confessed with a smile, but Anzu could see some tears creeping out of the corners of his eyes.

"I know, Dad…"

"But you're some magical girl hero now, so it's not like anything can be changed. Besides, no matter what you are or what you choose to be, you'll always be my daughter, and I can't make decisions for you unless you ask me to," Juunosuke told her.

"Anzu! What is the meaning of this?! You have some explaining to do when we get home! You've been masquerading around fighting monsters?! If I was still married to your father I'd ground you!" Reika bellowed.

Anzu found herself blubbering. "Mom!" She leaped on Reika and cried into her shirt. Reika stopped complaining and stroke Anzu's back. A warm smile formed on her face.

The next morning, Anzu woke up to find Reika giving Junnosuke a paper. Reika was fully dressed and had traces of lipstick and eye shadow on her face. "You're...okay with this?" Junnosuke asked.

Reika nodded with a soft expression. She no longer exuded the cold, imposing air like she used to. "I'm sorry for everything. I've been a horrible person. Anzu...truly is better off with you. I see that now. I should have been more understanding. Thank you for taking care of her, Jun. I'm sorry we can't make things work between us," Reika told him in a soft voice.

For once, Anzu felt bad for her mother. Sad, even. She seemed to finally get it. Reika turned around to leave. "Wait!"

Reika stopped. "What is it?"

"You know...Anzu still needs a mother. We...we'd appreciate it if you'd come and visit again sometime. That play called Wicked is going to show sometime in the next two months. Anzu and I really love it. We'd love it if we could bring you."

Anzu decided to come out and stand at her father's side. Some tears streamed out of Reika's face. "I'll...see what I can do. Anzu...thank you for telling the truth. I needed that."

"Yeah, you did," Anzu deadpanned.

"I'm sorry...for making your life difficult. Your friends are nice kids. You're lucky to have such great friends. Just...take care of yourself, okay? Be good, and...don't let anyone tell you who you are."

Anzu gave Reika a quick hug and a goodbye before letting go. For the first time in a very long while, the two finally understood each other. Perhaps a bond began to form.

* * *

In some woody but well maintained stables, Queen Malgorzata fed a single carrot to a green eyed alicorn while others whinnied right next to it. As it chomped on the carrot contentedly, Malgorzata stroke the alicorn's shimmering rainbow mane gently, with a sweet but sad looking smile. "Good girl, Egrantine. You're finally eating," Malgorzata said.

"Egrantine's finally eating, huh?" The deep, rich, gentle voice of a man asked. Malgorzata turned around to find a man walking behind her, who looked very much like the king of a powerful country. The man had poofy dark blonde hair with a fully grown dark yellow beard and mustache to match, setting off his dark burgundy eyes. Crowning his head was a shimmering golden crown with some rubies and sapphires glued around it. He was wearing a midnight black shirt, matching pants, tall beige boots, and a dark blue and white cape with lots of fur on the collar that trailed past his feet, but were rolled up right now so as to keep it from getting dirty from the mud beneath his feet.

"Hello, Ghislain," Malgorzata said. Ghislain embraced her and pecked a kiss on her soft cheek.

"Sorry I arrived so late, dear. I had business to take care of in some neighboring cities. Zenjin did quite a number on this planet," Ghislain told her calmly.

"Yes. I've been busy too," Malgorzata said. She turned around to face the alicorn she just fed. "But I'm at least happy Rozaniela is trying to recover from this disaster, even if it's just a little bit. Poor Egrantine hasn't been the same since her foal died in the destruction. But now she's finally accepting food."

"Egrantine may be on the road to recovery, but there are others who are so damaged by what happened that the scars on both their bodies and hearts can never be truly healed," Ghislain said as he walked toward Egrantine and stroke her rainbow mane gently. The alicorn next to her whinnied.

"Hold on, Raessa. Here's your share," Malgorzata crooned gently as she handed the carrot to the alicorn next to Egrantine, Raessa. "I'd best give some to Britannia and Faustino, too," Malgorzata gave more carrots to two other alicorns.

"By the way, I hear you've met the Pretty Cure, the heroes who will defeat Zenjin," Ghislain said.

"Yes. I've met them. They're just little foals so far, but I have faith in them, and they show a lot of potential and promise," Malgorzata told him as she finished feeding the alicorn named Britannia, who whinnied for more. "Now now, Brit. Food is scarce, so that's all for today," She turned to Ghislain again. "As of now, we have no idea where Zenjin is hiding. But we definitely know who's been helping him out."

Although it broke her heart to subject her husband with this heartbreaking information, she knew she had to. She told him about the Pretty Cure's encounters with Decebal and Beileag, and their supposed involvement in the whole fiasco. Ghislain was so shocked, he had to sit down on a chair to take it all in. He buried his face in his hands, but he didn't cry. "I'm sorry this had to come to pass."

"It's alright, Mal. Honestly, I'm not surprised anymore. I knew something was off about Decebal, but I was a fool to hire him back even when my gut was telling me not to. How could I have been so blind to everything?" Ghislain muttered grimly.

Malgorzata put a gentle hand on his shoulder. "You're not the only one. We both failed to notice the signs. We both gave him easy access to the Energia, and God only knows what he, Zenjin, and Beileag plan to do with the Energia."

"Decebal and Zenjin, I can somewhat understand, but what flummoxes me is Billie. Why is she involved in this? Isn't she your designer? She has no reason to want the Energia," Ghislain asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Malgorzata said. "But...even though circumstances are dire, I believe in the Pretty Cure. I'd like for you to meet them some time. If they're in trouble, I'll be more than willing to help out."

"I know you would, Malgorzata. Nobody on Rozaniela can joust or ride an alicorn in armor as well as you can. But my friends and I are searching for the royal library. It has important archives in it left behind by our ancestors, and as things stand, we cannot afford to lose them. They might contain information about our ancestors and what we can do to ameliorate our current situation, among other mysteries. I figure now's a good time to save them and finally decipher them."

"How will you be able to decipher them? They're written in a language we can't understand, and there's no one on this planet that can read it."

"Technology has evolved over the years, and it's amazing what it can do. But I only pray that the archives are safe and undamaged."

Malgorzata gripped part of her shirt. She hoped so too, but she had her doubts.

* * *

**Author's Note: I changed Reika's entire characterization, added some extra scenes, changed some things around, etc. Hope this helps. I also nixed some things in much later chapters and will plan outlines for them later on. Hope this helps!**


	22. The Story of The First Pretty Cure

_**ATTENTION: TRIGGER WARNING FOR CHILD ABUSE AND ATOMIC BOMB REFERENCES.**_

* * *

Chapter 21: Cures Daylight and Sunlight! Take a Trip Down Memory Lane!

King Ghislain, riding his blue eyed alicorn, is overseeing a huge crowd of people digging through a huge pile of debris, pulling out various books, and taking them away in wheelbarrows. Some people pulled out some books one at a time to put them in plastic bags. Others took them out in huge piles, putting them in one big bag and throwing them in wheelbarrows. Others aren't even bagging them, just putting them in wheelbarrows.

"Don't be rough with the books! Preserve them and their contents to the best of your ability!" King Ghislain commanded in a booming voice, with a whinny coming from his alicorn.

"Yes sir!" The people exclaimed as they dug through more debris as gently as possible, praying that whatever books are inside are still in tact. Unfortunately, some people did dig out some damaged books. Some had their covers completely ripped off. Some had their spines bent, twisted, and contorted in odd angles. Others had most of their pages completely smudged beyond repair or ripped out completely. Other books didn't even make it out alive, coming out as nothing but dusty pieces of chair. Some were cut in half. Some are covered in mud, dirt, and dust.

One man with blonde hair, wearing a dark brown robe approached the king. "Your majesty. I'm sorry to impose, but do you happen to know what the archives look like? What color are they? Do they have gold lettering?"

"The archives have a dark green leather cover, and the writing on them is printed in gold and silver, in pictures and languages we cannot understand. There are also some scrolls among them. If I remember correctly, the scrolls are in silver titanium thermoses," King Ghislain explained kindly.

"Thank you, your majesty," The man curtsied to the king before getting back into the search. The alicorn beneath King Ghislain whinnied.

"You want me to join them, Vespasian?" King Ghislain said as he stroke his alicorn's mane gently. "I suppose I should," Ghislain hopped off of Vespasian's back, ambled to the rubble, and began rummaging through the many piles of bricks, wood, and whatever else he could dig through.

"But your majesty! You'll hurt yourself or sully your robes!" One woman exclaimed worriedly.

"The loss of my robes is nothing compared to what everyone else has lost. Furthermore, these archives are a priority. Keep digging!" King Ghislain replied as he gently pushed some bricks away. Nobody questioned his involvement in the search after that.

The denizens rummaging through the rubble seemed to grow more exhausted by the hour, but most kept going, even as others went to get a quick drink of water. Others just kept digging and pulling out more books, both damaged and undamaged. King Ghislain did stop to wipe off some sweat for a bit, but continued on after he took some breaths. Some medical staff stayed within the vicinity in case they found anyone who was hurt, dead, or in need of some attention. The men lifted all the bricks, wood, and broken furniture as gently as they could muster, as any sudden movement or reckless move could hurt themselves, damage the books, or cost them their chances of finding the important archives.

In the midst of the rubble, one woman with long braids removed a brick from the pile and stopped when she saw something peeking out from underneath a piece of wood. Something dark green. She stroke her hand against the material. It felt soft but hard at the same time. There was no mistaking it. This was leather. She very carefully removed the piece of wood, which turned out to be not as heavy as it looked, revealing the rest of the thick dark green book. To her joy, there was gold lettering on it, written in an unknown language. Aside from a few spots of dirt, the book looked undamaged. She picked it up and happily ran to where the king is.

"Your majesty!" The woman yelled, successful in getting his attention. Without saying anything, she gleefully handed the thick green book to the king. He skimmed through it to see if it was what he expected it to be. There were old pictures. The whole book was written in a language he couldn't understand. None of the pages were tattered in any way, save for some folded corners and the fact that the paper was yellowing somewhat. He cracked a smile.

"Yes! This is one of the archives! Good work, Elphaba!" King Ghislain exalted the woman, Elphaba, then stood up. "Everyone! One of the archives has been recovered! The scrolls may be among them, so keep looking, and take great care when handling them!"

The denizens rejoiced before returning to digging in the rubble. As for King Ghislain, he hopped back on Vespasian's back as the alicorn ascended into the sky, heading toward a tall but slightly battered castle that greatly resembled the Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany, only less clean.

As dismal as it looked on the outside, most of the inside had come out unscathed, and the castle itself is still standing. Vespasian descended before a balcony, allowing King Ghislain to hop into it. Vespasian flew away as the king arrived in a white room full of old paintings. Queen Malgorzata sat in the room, reading through some old letters.

"Malgorzata!" King Ghislain exclaimed happily. "We've managed to save one of the archives!"

"What?!" Malgorzata stood up in alarm as her husband handed her the slightly dirty book. As soon as she stroke the leather cover and the golden letters with her fingers, her heart was aglow with joy. "They're safe...thank goodness...now we can learn more about our creation, maybe find a way to deal with Zenjin," Malgorzata mused with a smile, closing her eyes. "The Pretty Cure must know about this."

"We've found some other books in relatively good condition, so I'll have some of my friends peruse those in search for answers," King Ghislain said.

Malgorzata smiled. This was a step in the right direction.

* * *

"Uuuugh! I am so gonna fail the test!" Riko complained in the park one day as she looked over her notes from math class, accompanied by the fairies, Kyoya, Anzu, Marina, Hotaru, and even Fukiko.

"You don't know that," Moonbeam told her reassuringly.

"Yes I do! I stink at math!" Riko snapped.

"We all hate math. But you're good at everything else. You got an A on your cat presentation. Remember?" Marina told her.

"Your grades are good, considering all the A's and B's I've seen you get on all your stuff lately," Anzu said.

"It's true. I wish I was as smart as you," Fukiko said with Starbeam snugly tucked in her arms.

They were right about the A's and B's Riko had been getting on various worksheets and pop quizzes. She just aced one spelling test with flying colors, even getting extra points for spelling the extra credit words perfectly. Not only that, she got one of the highest marks on a recent science quiz.

"I'm not smart at all," Riko mused irritably. "I can't even get these dumb math equations in my head!"

Kyoya put a hand on Riko's shoulder. "You'll do just fine. Just do the best you can."

All of a sudden, Sunbeam's ComLap appeared from her bow clip, flipping open and showing Queen Malgorzata's face on the screen. "Queen? What's up?"

"_Sunbeam. Would it be okay for you, your sisters, and the Pretty Cure to come to Rozaniela?"_ Queen Malgorzata asked.

"Whoa! Is this for real?!" Fukiko exclaimed as she looked into the ComLap screen. She couldn't believe this was real.

Queen Malgorzata was taken aback a bit. _"Hello there. Who might you be?"_

"Queen, this is my friend, Dounowaki Fukiko," Kyoya introduced Fukiko to the queen. Now Fukiko was taken aback. He called her his friend. He didn't do that before. If he was referring to her as his friend now, this meant that he had forgiven her. A parade of celebratory butterflies launched in her stomach, and she felt like bursting into song, but she kept silent. Whoever this queen was, she must be contacting them about something important.

"What do you want us to come for?" Lovebeam asked.

"_My husband and some denizens of Rozaniela are on a mission to preserve books from our sacred library, books that may or may not contain information about the Energia and our ancestors that may be beneficial to our current situation. We've managed to save many books, including one piece of ancient archives that our ancestors left to us long ago,"_ Queen Malgorzata explained calmly. _"But most of my servants are wandering through Rozaniela in search of survivors, and my husband and his friends are still trying to scour the sacred library, so I was wondering if you could come and browse through some of the books we managed to save, just to find information on the Energia that may prove to be useful. I love books just as much as the next person, but I can only read so much in one day, and there are piles of books here that I've never even touched, let alone knew they even existed."_

"Wait. You say this library is sacred, but you never touched any of the books in it?" Marina asked, flummoxed. "What's up with that?"

"_The sacred library was left by our ancestors. It's the oldest building in all of Rozaniela. But all of it's books have been securely locked away long ago, with a message to never open them up unless we are in a situation where reading them is dire,"_ The Queen clarified.

"I happen to have a very open passion for reading, so I would be more than happy to assist in your endeavor, Your Highness," Starbeam said.

The Queen smiled sweetly. _"I'm glad. But you don't have to come if you don't want to. This task may take all day, and I don't want to get in the way of your lives. Being a Pretty Cure may be important, but your real, personal lives are just as important."_

"I've been studying all day, but I guess a break wouldn't hurt," Anzu said.

"Count me in!" Kyoya piped in.

"I don't have anything planned, so I'll come too," Hotaru said.

"You should come to Rozaniela, Fukiko. It's a wonderful place! It's a little banged up because someone tried to destroy it, though," Kyoya explained.

"Do you mean...there's a new planet we don't know about?!" Fukiko yelped in a high voice when the implications of Kyoya's words dawned on her.

"Yep! It's where we come from!" Moonbeam chirped.

"Um...would it be okay if I stayed here?" Riko asked shyly, her eyes trembling like she was fearing everyone would flip out at her answer.

"How come?" Marina asked softly. Riko found herself taken aback. Usually, Marina got angry whenever she said just about anything related to the Pretty Cure. Now she was calm? Riko wondered if this was the same person.

"I mean, I'd love to help you guys out, but...I really need to pass this math test! If I don't, it'll completely ruin my grade, and my grade in math is horrible enough as it is! Believe me, I'd much rather go to Rozaniela and read a bunch of books!" Riko exclaimed nervously.

She felt a gentle pat on her shoulder. Riko thought it was Anzu, but it turned out to be someone she never expected, the one person she thought who'd never do something like this, especially in a calm manner. "Sure. We totally get it. We don't wanna get in the way of your studying, so you do your thing. We'll handle things from here," Marina told her calmly, with a smile to go with it.

"Yeah. Real life is just as important as being a Pretty Cure, like the queen just said. If we find anything, we'll let you know ASAP," Kyoya piped in.

"That's true," Hotaru piped in. "Don't worry about a thing, Riko-chan. Queen Malgorzata understands, and we do too."

Riko felt like crying right then and there. She expected them to be completely angry. Instead, they understood completely and didn't make a huge deal out of it. She found herself clutching her math notes tightly.

"You're not mad at me?" Riko asked in a low whisper.

"No. Why would we be?" Anzu asked.

"Everybody gets angry whenever I say just about anything, and they interpret it wrong and think I'm a bad person forever," Riko said, louder this time but not too loud.

"Friends aren't like that, and you know it. Stay and study for your test. We don't mind," Marina told her kindly.

"Thank you…" Riko whimpered. She looked as though she was going to burst into tears. She never did get used to their kindness.

"Want to go right now?" Fukiko suggested. "I have to be back by five, though."

"Us too," Anzu piped in, with Marina, Kyoya, and Hotaru nodding in unison.

"So, off to Rozaniela we go!" Lovebeam exclaimed as she and her sisters formed a circle around everyone sans Riko. Soon, a portal opened and devoured them all, leaving Riko all alone. She put her eyes back on her math notes, but oh, how she yearned to join them!

"Whoooaaa! This cannot be real!" Fukiko stared in awe in the glowing tunnel she and everyone else are floating in. "Everything's all glowy! And I'm floating!"

"Trust me, you ain't seen nothin' yet!" Anzu piped in cheerfully.

"Look! There it is!" Sunbeam yelped. Soon, the kids found themselves out of the portal and in front of a very tall, very grand, very grandiose castle.

Fukiko wasted no time becoming awestruck by the whole thing, as her hazel eyes became wide like saucers, sparkling with joy. "Wooow! I've never seen a real castle up close before! And what is this place?! The sky is pink! The trees are all different colors! And look! Are those winged unicorns?! Oh my gosh, I cannot believe all of this is real!"

"We're not here to go sightseeing, even though we kinda want to. We're here to help the queen look through the books they saved so we can find a way to stop Zenjin," Marina told her calmly.

"IS this her castle, though?" Hotaru asked. "We've never been to the queen's castle before."

"Yep! This is her castle! My sisters and I have been here lots of times before!" Lovebeam chirped.

"True true!" Starbeam agreed.

"Let's go inside! We'll show you where the queen's room is!" Sunbeam said as she and the fairies flitted into the castle.

"Wait!" Anzu suddenly shouted. "Does this castle have any elevators?"

"No. Why...oh," Sunbeam was about to ask why, but then it dawned on her. Kyoya's in a wheelchair, and he probably can't go beyond the first floor.

"You made it!" A familiar, gentle voice crooned behind them.

"Queen!" The fairies flitted to her and nuzzled her face like they haven't seen her in years. The Queen simply smiled and nudged them all with her hands sweetly.

"Hello, my little dears," The Queen said.

"Umm...hello! I-I-I-I'm Dounowaki…Fu-Fu-Fu-Fukiko! It's a...pleasure to meet you, Your Most Royal Highness!" Fukiko stammered and bowed deeply as the fairies flew back to them. The Queen chuckled a bit.

"It's nice to meet you too. But there's no need for formalities here. Feel free to call me Mal or just Queen Mal. It's shorter," The Queen said as Fukiko raised her head.

"Umm...I don't mean to be rude, but...how come you're dressed like that?" Fukiko asked as politely as she could, hoping she wasn't being rude when pointing out Malgorzata's Native American style raiment. "Don't queens normally wear regal, beautiful ballroom dresses or something?"

"I have some, but I'm not a fan of them. I happen to like Native American style clothes. There's so much history to them, and they're quite loose and comfortable," The Queen told her kindly. But then she noticed someone was missing. "I take it Riko-chan couldn't come?"

"Yes. She has a math test to study for. She really wanted to come, though," Moonbeam explained.

"I see. Come on inside. All of the books are here on the first floor," The Queen invited them inside and the kids came right in. But they stopped in their tracks upon seeing the staggering piles of books in the room. Some towered and staggered like they were going to fall and scatter all over the place.

Marina did a double take. "We have to read all of these?"

"I don't mind. We'd best get to it," Hotaru said, having already picked up a book and skimmed through some pages.

Without any more complaints, the kids and fairies perused through the books, looking for anything that might be pertinent regarding the Energia or the creation of Rozaniela. The queen had to leave to attend to some of her duties. They went through more books by the hour, having found nothing so far. Marina found one book with something written on the preface.

"_To anyone who is concerned,_

_If you happen to be Japanese, we apologize for stealing your language and writing system. We do have our own, but some of this information is extremely confidential, and if it falls into the wrong hands, someone could use it for evil purposes. Japanese happens to be one of the hardest languages in the world to learn and use, so we borrowed it for safety reasons. We hope you can forgive us. We have no intention of claiming your language to be ours. If you had information you wouldn't want people to read or use for evil purposes, wouldn't you do the same?_

_Sincerely,_

_Glinda of the Tree of Life."_

"Who's Glinda?" Marina muttered aloud, feeling satisfied for finding out why most of these books were in Japanese. She did smile upon seeing a little tree drawn next to the signature in charcoal.

"I know Glinda's one of the main characters from Wicked," Anzu said as she put one book away and started on another.

"And what's the Tree of Life?" Sunbeam asked.

"Hey! I think I found something!" Fukiko exclaimed before reading aloud.

"All Rozanielan life began from the Tree of Life. It is a tree that has floated through space for generations. How a tree is able to wander through space even though it is a plant that depends on water and sunlight to survive, we haven't the faintest clue. The Tree of Life stands on the very top of Rozaniela, far north, where sunlight and water are plentiful. It is the tallest, biggest, most grand tree in all of the world, with balls of warm, golden light shining from all of its branches. We presume these lights are where we come from," Fukiko read from the book out loud.

"That kinda reminds me of a Sailor Moon episode I saw," Hotaru said.

"There's more here," Fukiko added. "Ever since our birth, we resided in the tree of life and the barrier that kept us inside. We lived content, comfortable lives, discovering the extent of our powers, our powers of creation. We did try living on other planets, but they weren't hospitable due to their lack of oxygen and basic life, so we resided in the tree for the time being. However, some of my friends grew to despise each other, using their powers in ways I cannot describe. I did not partake in any of the battles that followed, as I am a pacifist, averse to fighting and bloodlust.

"When too many casualties came to light, my friends finally reached an understanding. They decided that the tree from which they come from does not wish to see them fight over such petty things, and to stop relying on it for everything. We searched far and wide for a place we could live, so we could grow as a people, to learn a great many things, and live peacefully by our own means, so the tree can be happy. It took us years, but we finally found a planet. Earth. Some of us even lived there for a while, myself included. But while Earth does have many good things going for it, there's still so much wrong with the humans that live there," Fukiko stumbled on a lot of the words as she read through the paragraphs and passages.

But she continued on. "We came during a time of unrest and tension. Wars were being fought in various countries. Some were still struggling to create new countries or take back what was theirs. We were especially appalled by some of the so called rules that people of all kinds were expected to follow: Women are only allowed to wear dresses, get married, and become mothers. Dark skinned people are savage beasts who have no place in this world other than to be slaves. Orphans, illegitimate children, and the disabled are all considered inhuman by various powers that be. Can you believe these absurd, ridiculous rules society puts on people? Discriminating against others just because they have abnormalities, like different skin colors or missing limbs? To me, that is just terrible. My parents always allowed me to do whatever I want, like wear pants, leap off branches, and always encouraged me to follow my dreams and be kind to everyone, no matter who or what they are.

"Naturally, we decided that living on Earth wasn't worth it. It was at this time when one of my friends tested out one of her powers, and accidentally created a planet out of his magic. We thought it was an illusion at first, but it was real. My best friend, Felicie, created the planet we live on today. Using the knowledge we obtained from Earth, we grew plants on our planet, built civilizations, raised animals, and created our new lives. We named the planet Rozaniela, which in Polish means happiness and well being, because we want our planet to be a nice, happy place where everyone of all faiths, creeds, and races can live and coexist peacefully, without conflict or unrealistic expectations, where everyone is free to be themselves, unrestrained by ridiculous rules.

"We also happened to adopt many orphaned infants whose caretakers couldn't care less for their welfare. We couldn't just sit there and let them be hurt or even die, so we took them to our planet to raise for ourselves, so they can grow up and live happy lives, full of love and appreciation, things they never received in those awful orphanages," Fukiko stopped upon reading that last line. Then, a realization slapped her in the face. "Hey! I've heard something like this on the news! A bunch of babies are being stolen from third world orphanages by the truckloads! Are these people the ones responsible?!"

"Yeah," Marina deadpanned. "I know, I know, it sounds like kidnapping. We're kinda weirded out by it too."

"Is there anything more in there?" Moonbeam asked, peeking her head out from a book.

Fukiko skimmed through the book. "Hmm...no. Not after this. It's just a bunch of information on stuff like jousting, how to garden, a bunch of Rozaniela recipes…"

The girls and fairies went back to perusing through the many piles of books. It seemed to go on for hours until Sunbeam blurted out, "I found something on the Energia!"

"The Energia? Well, read it!" Kyoya exclaimed.

"Got it," Sunbeam began. "The Energia is shaped like a diamond. We picked the diamond shape because it is sleek and shapely, but still has enough space to store lots of energy. We named it the Energia because in Rozanielan language, the word energy translates to "limitless power" and the word "Gia," which also counts as a person's name, translates to heart or soul. We learned from Earth that diamonds are the hardest jewels in the world, and nothing can penetrate their exterior. They're so hard, they're used to deflect bullets. However, we have no way of checking whether the Energia has that kind of strength.

"After Rozaniela was created and steadily populated, me and my friends decided to seal all of our limitless power inside of it. That way, no other human being can get their hands on it, especially those with ill intentions. Not only that, if we hide it deep within the core of Rozaniela, nobody can ever enter, as it is nigh impossible for any normal human, fairy, or other worldly creature to have any form of access to it, especially if strong and efficient security systems are in place. No one should be cursed with these limitless powers, as they are easily susceptible to misuse. I can only hope that future generations, Earth and Rozaniela, can live in peace and continue to understand each other and accept each other, even in the face of hardship."

"I just found something on this Felicie person!" Moonbeam exclaimed, holding up a pink book.

"What's it say?" Kyoya asked.

"Lemme see...oh! Here we go! Felicie is a very dear friend of mine. She has the kindest, warmest, most caring heart of all. She is rather eccentric, however. Always flapping her hands, rocking back and forth when she's scared, screaming when she's mad, and getting angry when her daily routine is broken. But she doesn't mean any harm. In fact, she is quite the sweetheart, and has always been there for me since we were born. I still find it hard to believe that she is the one who created Rozaniela," Moonbeam recited.

"Are there any pictures of her?" Fukiko asked.

"No. There aren't any pictures in any of these books," Moonbeam said, sounding disappointed.

"Why does she remind me of Riko?" Hotaru whispered out loud.

"Anyone want to take a break? My eyes feel like they're gonna fall out," Lovebeam asked.

"I guess it wouldn't hurt," Anzu said.

"Hey. You guys hear all that yelling outside?" Fukiko asked as a faint but roaring sound caught her ear.

"Let's check it out! It sounds like it's right outside the castle," Kyoya said, already wheeling toward the entrance. Everyone else followed suit.

When they went outside, they found a huge crowd of people gathered around. The Queen, riding her alicorn wearing jousting armor, holding a lance in her hand, is racing toward another fellow jouster, successfully breaking his lance. Everyone cheered when Malgorzata won the match.

"Jousting?" Anzu asked.

"The Queen is very good at jousting. It's one of her favorite past times," Starbeam told them.

"Wanna watch?" Marina asked. Everyone nodded and broke through the crowd so they could watch.

A few more jousting matches followed, and each time, Malgorzata won. She single handedly defeated every challenger who dared to face her. But she never wore any faces that made her come off as arrogant or full of herself, nor did she boast. She simply helped up every challenger she defeated as everyone else rejoiced in her victories. After a while, the citizens scattered, returning to their missions to rebuild homes, give food and clothes to the poor, and find survivors of Zenjin's worldwide attack. The kids and fairies found themselves awestruck as Malgorzata removed her armor.

"A little jousting really does work up an appetite. But it sure is fun," Malgorzata said as she wiped some sweat off her face.

"Wow! You were awesome back there!" Marina exclaimed cheerfully, her golden eyes sparkling.

"Oh no. I'm not worthy of such praise. My opponents deserve just as much of it, if not more," Malgorzata told her modestly.

"Why are you jousting in front of your castle?" Fukiko asked.

"There's nothing wrong with a little fun time every once in a while, even in the midst of despair. If we spent our lives being serious all the time and only doing what others want us to do, there wouldn't be any joy in anything. Sometimes a little fun and laughter is a great medicine for sadness. Just a little bit of it is able to take us away from our despair," Malgorzata explained kindly.

"True that," Anzu piped in, agreeing with her statement. She learned that from experience.

"By the way, have you found anything in the books we saved so far?" Malgorzata asked kindly.

"Not much on Pretty Cure, but we did learn about your ancestors and how they came from a giant tree floating in space," Kyoya explained first. "Some of those books were written by someone named Glinda. Would you happen to know who that is?"

"Glinda? Not very much, but I do know she was one of the first people to be born from the Tree of Life, as I've heard from my parents," Malgorzata explained. "I wasn't there when they started taking orphans from third world countries."

"We also learned about the Energia, why it's shaped like a diamond, and where it's name comes from. Here's the book," Marina said as she handed Malgorzata the book.

"I was there when our ancestors created the Energia and sealed it away, deep beneath the core of the planet. One of their descendants, Sharleigh, who was also my mother, crowned me Queen of Rozaniela at that time, in the hopes that me and my husband, Ghislain, can lead Rozaniela to a bright, happy, and prosperous future, and keep the Energia out of evil hands."

"Are you immortal by any chance?" Sunbeam asked.

"Yes. Mother thought I would be the best person to lead Rozaniela to happiness, and I drank a potion of immortality that came from her powers before she sealed them in the Energia. Even if I live to see many people be born and die, I will shoulder the burden of taking care of Rozaniela for life," Malgorzata told her with a somber face.

The children looked away, feeling the implications of Malgorzata's words dawn on them, and they certainly thought her fate stunk. Living forever has its pros and cons, after all. Anzu and Moonbeam had to wonder how the Queen held out as long as she did.

"One thing I notice is that everyone's always so nice to each other," Marina said. "Nobody picks on each other or anything. Everyone's always helping each other."

"I'm glad you noticed that, Marina-chan. Rozaniela's number one rule is for everyone to be understanding and kind to everyone of all races, species, orientations, etc. We don't stand for hatred or malice in this world, even though it still persists. I try my best to set a good example for my citizens, but I don't know if I'm doing a very good job of it," Malgorzata explained with one hand on her heart.

"I think you're doing just fine," Hotaru piped in kindly. "If you weren't, then nobody on this planet would like you or do so much for your sake."

Malgorzata nodded. "That's true."

"By the way, you told us once that there were Pretty Cure before us, right? Cures Sunlight and Daylight?" Anzu asked. "What were they like? Can you tell us more about them?"

"Sure! I'd be happy to," Malgorzata said, her beaming smile returning in full force. "Let's talk inside. It's better than standing around here."

They went back into the room full of books and sat down. "You said their names were Youko and Hinata, right?" Anzu asked.

"Yes. Nozawa Youko and Akai Hinata," Malgorzata began. "I came across them on my own visit to Earth once. I had only just begun my reign as Queen, and I was curious to learn more about Earth and it's ways."

(flashback)

_Malgorzata arrived on Earth dressed in a particularly pretty cherry blossom pink yukata with red flowers decorating it, a matching red obi, Japanese geta sandals, and a big red hibiscus flower hair clip in her silver hair. Although she preferred her favorite Native American style garb, she took on the yukata so she wouldn't stand out as much, or have people question where she came from. She did like the yukata, but she found the sandals to be very hard to walk on. Every step she walked, she wobbled and felt like she was going to fall. Thankfully, she managed to maintain her balance the more she walked._

_She liked the traditional Japanese houses with their sliding doors, hooked roofs, tatami mats, among other things. A little boy handed a newspaper to her sadly before running off. Malgorzata noticed that the boy's eyes are red and swollen, like he had been crying. She sat down on a bench and opened the newspaper, dated 1942. The headlines read _'Tokyo Bombed By Air Raid! City In Flames!'

_Her eyes widened with horror upon reading the newspaper, detailing the horrible tale of Tokyo being destroyed by fire bombs and the immeasurable amount of people who died. The pictures certainly didn't help matters either. They were black and white, but they didn't obscure the clouds of smoke curling from the decimated city, the flames dancing on the ground, the piles of black, burned corpses, people with flames on their faces, arms, and other parts of their body struggling to escape. The newspaper also said something about Americans being responsible for the bombings. Malgorzata was appalled by the event before, but upon seeing this, she facepalmed._

"_Why do people have to hurt each other?" Malgorzata mused to herself sadly as she put the newspaper on the bench and walked away. But before she could go any further, she felt a chubby, marshmallow-like mass bump into her. She almost fell over, but she managed to regain her balance. When she looked down, she saw a very plump little girl of about eight years old, with a fat face and matching chubby cheeks. _

_But what was unsettling to Malgorzata was that the girl's left eye was extremely swollen, an ugly mixture of yellow and purple. The girl also had some red marks on her arms and legs. The girl's small eyes were a light shade of hazel, with more shades of brown than green. Her hair was dark blonde tied in dangly little pig tails with green scrunchies. She was wearing a dirty white shirt with some dust and dirt marks on it, along with a pair of poofy blue pants. She was barefoot, with one of her toes bleeding a little, like she stubbed it on something hard. One of her sleeves was ripped to the point of almost coming right off. The girl's cheeks were wet and shining under the sun, which told Malgorzata everything she needed to know._

"_Hello, little girl. Why do you cry so?" Malgorzata crooned in a gentle voice as she kneeled down to the girl's level. The little girl continued to snivel and sob. "What happened to you, dear?"_

"_Please...please help me! Gramma hates me!" The little girl cried, with more tears streaming down her fat face. Already, Malgorzata's heart went out to the sad little girl. She stroke her blonde hair gently._

"_What happened to you?" Malgorzata asked gently._

"_I dun wanna be with Gramma anymore! She yells at me all the time! She hits me a lot, calls me names, and says I gots bad blood in me!" The little girl wailed sadly._

_Malgorzata wondered if the girl ran away. Based on her account, she probably couldn't take it anymore. Nevertheless, she pitied the little girl and held her close. "Your grandmother shouldn't treat you like that. You deserve better. I don't think you have bad blood. I'm sure you're a wonderful girl," Malgorzata told her gently._

_The girl's sniveling softened a bit. "You really think so?"_

"_I know so," Malgorzata smiled upon saying this, which made the girl smile._

_Unfortunately, her smile faded as soon as it appeared. "Youko! Where are you, you wretched half-breed?!"_

"_Oh no! Gramma!" The little girl, Youko, hid behind Malgorzata as an old woman, wearing a dark green kimono, orange obi, and with her grey hair tied up in a odango bun came onto the scene. The old woman's face looked like it was made of stone, completely stern and emotionless, but she could see twinges of anger swirling around in them. Malgorzata didn't like what she saw. She stood firmly in front of the frightened girl, staring daggers at the old woman._

"_Would you happen to be this girl's grandmother?" Malgorzata asked calmly, hoping she didn't lose her cool._

"_That is none of your concern. Come with me, Youko. You need to be punished for defying me again," The woman said sternly as she tried to approach Malgorzata to try and take Youko back by force. Malgorzata was quick to act, as she stayed in front of the girl, keeping the old woman away from her. "Why do you stand in my way?"_

"_What do you mean by defying you? What has she done to deserve getting beaten to the point of getting a black eye? And furthermore, you're her grandmother but you don't even like her. Where are her parents?" Malgorzata asked._

"_Her father is an American. They're the ones who are causing Japan so much suffering! But one of those blasted soldiers eloped with my daughter, and she died three years ago from tuberculosis!" The woman saw a flash of herself crying at the side of a younger woman, unconscious in a bed, with a wet cloth on her forehead. "Someone has to keep that half-breed on a leash. She's nothing but trouble, and I can't have that devil's spawn contaminating the rest of our society," The woman exclaimed with malice dripping in her calm voice._

_Already Malgorzata wanted to just leave. "You talk as though Youko-chan is a monster. Just because she's of mixed ancestry doesn't mean she'll turn out bad. I'm sure not ALL Americans are bad, and you shouldn't be cruel to Youko because of something that isn't her fault," Malgorzata told her defensively._

"_You know nothing! Now, out of my way! That child has to come back to me!"_

"_You don't even like her! She deserves better than the way you treat her!"_

_Malgorzata took Youko by the hand and ran from the scene rather hastily. Youko didn't seem to mind despite the fact that her feet are hurting. Malgorzata ran through the streets of whatever Japanese city she was in, looking for a police station. There had to be one around here somewhere. She needed to tell them about this. Youko deserved better. _

_She finally found a police station about a mile away. She found a police officer and told him about what happened, but the man seemed world weary, like he hadn't slept in a few days. She and Youko sat in the waiting room and played hand games before the police man came back._

_Malgorzata did NOT like what she heard. "What?! You won't arrest her grandmother?!" She yelped, her eyes wide with shock._

"_We get cases like this every day, ma'am. There isn't much we can do. Plus, we have no proof that the girl is being abused. We have our hands full as it is with the war," The man told her grimly. She could see some sadness in his eyes, like he wanted to do something. "Besides, even if we could take her away from Nozawa-san, there isn't an orphanage in all of Japan that'll take a half-American child, especially at the rate Japan's going."_

"_Who cares about race?! That shouldn't matter here!" Malgorzata shouted._

"_I know how you feel, ma'am," The police officer stammered frightfully. "But that's just the way it is! I wish it were different, but there's nothing I can do! You'd best give her back. Even if Nozawa-san does beat her, she's a lot luckier than you think. Others don't have families anymore. At least Youko will have food, clothing, and shelter."_

_Malgorzata balled her fists. Even if Americans were responsible for Japan's crumbling state as of now, that was no reason to think they're all bad, and to Malgorzata, it doesn't justify abusing an innocent child. To Malgorzata, no child should be abused by their caretaker, especially for dumb reasons, even if they do get food, clothes, and shelter. Youko looked at Malgorzata with said eyes, like she wanted to cry some more._

"_No one like me. Daddy's gone. Mommy's gone," Youko whimpered sadly, having overheard the conversation._

_A crack appeared in Malgorzata's heart. She escorted the girl out of the police station. She then kneeled down to her level. "Would you like to come live with me?"_

(end flashback one, begin flashback two)

_Malgorzata, in a yellow kimono this time, looked at a newspaper, dated 1945. The big, bold headlines read _'Hiroshima and Nagasaki Bombed! Japan Surrenders!'_ With a sigh, she threw it into a nearby trash can. She heard some people yelling and crying, how their country shouldn't have lost the war. They could have had a chance. Malgorzata, sympathetic to their cause as she is, knew there wasn't much she could do to reassure them. She knew reality had to sink into their minds some time. _

_There was no denying it. She saw the pictures in the newspapers. The mushroom shaped cloud rising into the sky, polluting the once clean air. People of all ages without limbs, their bodies covered in flames or charred black skin, mangled and charred corpses lying amongst the aftermath. All of these made Malgorzata want to puke._

_As she walked through the busy but grim streets, she happened to come across a young girl of eleven sitting on a sidewalk, leaning against the brick walls of a closed down ice cream shop. The girl has very messy, scraggly red hair that looked like it hadn't been washed in days. Her eyes were a pale shade of brown, but they were swollen and red from too much crying. The girl was still crying, clinging to a pretty little plush doll with blonde hair and blue button eyes, wearing a cute little blue and white lace dress, with sewn on blue shoes and white stockings. The girl was dressed in rags, her tattered brown dress barely reaching her scratched up knees. The red haired girl's tears fell on the little doll. Malgorzata walked toward the girl and kneeled in front of her with pity in her green eyes._

"_Hello dear. What's wrong?" Malgorzata asked kindly. The girl closed her eyes and said nothing._

"_Where are your parents?" She asked. The girl shook her head. That told Malgorzata what she needed to know._

"_The bomb…" The girl croaked in a sad, raspy, choked voice, like she hadn't eaten or drank anything._

"_Do you have other family?"_

_She shook her head again._

"_What's your name, dear?"_

"_Hinata…"_

"_How long have you been like this?"_

"_Two weeks…"_

"_That's a cute doll you have there."_

_Hinata sniffed and sobbed again. "Mom made it for me on my 3rd birthday…I wanna make dolls when…hic...I grow up…"_

_Malgorzata smiled. At least she's getting something out of her. She extended her hand out to her with a warm smile. "Would you like to come live with me?"_

(end flashback two)

"Oh my gosh...that's so sad…" Fukiko muttered sympathetically.

"Sad, indeed!" Starbeam agreed.

"What happened next?" Hotaru asked.

"That's a much nicer story," Malgorzata began. "The girls blossomed when they came to Rozaniela. I couldn't take care of them myself because of my duties as Queen, so two of my knights offered to raise them as their own, since they've always wanted children. When they came to Rozaniela, it was like they became completely different people."

(flashback)

_Hinata, with her long red hair shiny and clean, wearing nice, brand new clothes, ran through the field of flowers with a face and smile that were so radiant and so blinding that one could mistake it for the sun itself. Instead of the rags she wore when Malgorzata found her, she's now wearing a dark blue buttoned up dress with short sleeves, a red and white skirt that goes down to her knees, and white laced shoes. In one of her hands was a big basket with an undressed, undecorated doll in it, some doll sized clothes she made herself, some knitting yarn, a box of sewing needles, and a juice box. _

_When she found a particularly nice spot, she sat down on her knees, pulled out the doll, and began putting a little white dress on her. She then sewed some dark brown buttons on the doll's face. When she finished that, she made a little stitchy mouth, sewed a blonde wig on it, and sewed some white shoes on the doll's feet. When she finished, she held the doll up in the air happily._

"_Yay! You're perfect! I think I'll call you Lacie!" Hinata exclaimed happily. _

_But before she put her doll down, she noticed another little girl about her own age sitting a few feet away from her. Her curly dark blonde hair trailed down to her shoulders. Her brown eyes, soft and warm, fixated on the flowers she was gathering in her chubby hands. She was wearing a pretty light green dress with lots of snow white flowers all over it, going way past her knees. She was also wearing dark green shoes and white tights. While she still had a plump, potato shaped face and plump legs, she lost a significant amount of weight in the years she spent on Rozaniela, having reached a healthier weight. Curious, Hinata stood up and walked over to the girl in the green dress._

_The girl smelled the flowers and relished their lovely aroma. "Beautiful…" She mused to herself sweetly._

"_Do you like flowers?" Hinata asked sweetly. The girl beneath her turned around with a gasp, surprised that another presence is behind her. Her face turning red like a tomato, she looked down and grabbed some more flowers._

"_Y-Y-Yes…" The curly haired girl replied sheepishly. Hinata kneeled to her level curiously._

"_I'm Akai Hinata! What's your name?" Hinata asked._

"_No-No-No-Nozawa...Youko…" The girl, Youko, replied shyly._

_With a yelp, Hinata clasped her hands together. "Hi, Youko-chan!"_

_Youko looked at Hinata's basket and noticed the doll in it. "Is that your doll?"_

_Happily, Hinata pulled her doll out to show Youko. "Yep! I just finished cleaning her up! Her name's Lacie!"_

_Youko flashed a small smile. "She's adorable."_

"_Thanks! I love making dolls look nice and making little doll clothes! When I grow up, I wanna make lots and lots of dolls, especially the pretty porcelain ones they used to display in the stores I'd pass whenever I'd go to school!" Hinata exclaimed happily._

_Much to Youko's surprise, she found herself enjoying the bubbly red haired girl's company. She liked her friendly attitude, her infectious smile, her radiant light brown eyes, the way she talked about the doll she made. "What do you wanna be when you grow up, Youko-chan? Do you wanna be a florist since you like flowers?"_

"_Nuh-uh. I want to do flower arranging," Youko told her shyly, but sweetly._

"_I think it's boring. I tried it once but couldn't get anything right," Hinata piped in._

"_My mother loved arranging flowers. Before she died, she would always show me the displays she made," Youko said._

_Hinata's smile faded and she donned a sympathetic look. "Your mom died? I'm sorry. Mine did too."_

"_You too?"_

"_Yep, along with everybody else. Atomic bombs."_

"_That's horrible! I wasn't there when the bombs hit, but some people have been telling me about them."_

"_I know," All of a sudden, Hinata's smile came back. "But enough sad stuff!" She suddenly stood up. "Hey! Wanna come to my house and play? I'd love to show you my little sewing machine and teach you how to make doll clothes! Wanna come? Please please please!" Hinata begged happily._

_Youko wasted no time answering. "Sure!"_

_Hinata took her by the hand. "So this means we're friends, right? Wanna be my friend?"_

"_Uhh...okay…"_

"_Yay! Come on!"_

_From a few feet away, Malgorzata smiled as Hinata dragged the surprised but endeared Youko away from the flower field, happy that those two were blossoming like newly born flowers in the spring sunshine._

(end flashback)

"I have a question!" Marina piped in. "How did you get the Heart Lighters? Do you know where they come from?"

"I'm afraid not, Marina-chan. All I know is that my mother gave me eight of them before she and the others put their powers inside the Energia forever. She told me that they're only useful when in dire straits. She put a note attached to two of them, but I was not to open it or read it until a time came when they were needed," Malgorzata explained. "Unfortunately, one of my friends went to Earth once with two of them to run some errands, but he dropped them. We tried looking for them, but we never found them. However, three years later, another one of my friends took the Energia to get it inspected, and he had a sudden errand to run in Earth before he came back. He dropped the Energia by accident and it fell in someone's hands."

"Do you know who?" Hotaru asked.

"Again, no. But news spreads fast in between worlds. I figured it'd be a good time to get the Heart Lighters out."

(flashback)

_14-year-olds Hinata and Youko sat in the front yard of a small cabin in a pretty meadow. Hinata showed off a new porcelain doll she designed clothes for, and Youko showed off a flower arrangement she made, even though it looked a little choppy and disorganized. Hinata didn't seem to mind._

"_Woooow! It's beautiful! You used tulips!" Hinata exclaimed happily._

_Youko looked away a little sheepishly. "Thanks, but it's not that good."_

_But before they could talk further, they saw Queen Malgorzata riding on her noble alicorn, Celestia, and descending in front of them. As Celestia's hooves touched the ground, Malgorzata leaped right off._

"_Hiya Mal!" Hinata exclaimed happily, waving to the grim looking queen._

"_Good morning, Your Royal Majesty," Youko politely curtsied to Malgorzata._

"_Girls, I'm sorry to bother you. Youko, is Gideon home by any chance?" Malgorzata asked._

"_Huh? Queen Mal," Confused, Hinata pointed to a bag Malgorzata has slung on her shoulder. "Your bag is glowing."_

"_What?!"_

_The bag was glowing in both a red and white light. The Queen opened her bag and pulled out two glass perfume bottles shaped like stars, one red one and one transparent white one. Hinata's eyes sparkled, awestruck by their beauty. The Queen, on impulse, twisted the caps on both of them, allowing the lights inside them to fly right out. The red light flew in front of an enthusiastic Hinata, the white light in front of a confused Youko._

"_What's happening?! What are these things?!" Youko asked frightfully. Hinata wasted no time grabbing the red light, which turned into a little red circle shaped stone. The red glass bottle glowed for a while before stopping, but the star shaped bottle now has a circle shaped cavity in it. Reluctantly, Youko grabbed the white light, which turned into a flower shaped white jewel. The white glass bottle glowed for a while before stopping, revealing a flower shaped cavity with six protrusions resembling petals._

"_What? What is this?" Malgorzata asked herself. Then she remembered. "The note!" She grabbed the note hanging from the red bottle and opened it. It turned out to be quite big. It had a list of instructions on it, two of them being… "Put the jewel in the cavity of the Heart Lighter. Shout 'Pretty Cure, let the light shine!' What does this mean?" She said aloud, loud enough for the girls to hear._

_Hinata grabbed the two bottles and handed the white one to Youko. They then put the jewels inside the Heart Lighters. "No! Wait-!"_

"_Pretty Cure, let the light shine!"_

_Before Malgorzata could do anything, Hinata was swamped by a tornado of red light, Youko drowning in a sea of white light. Soon, the lights dissipated, and the girls came out wearing different outfits. _

_Hinata was now wearing a sleeveless red shirt with white lace going across the front with red circle shaped buttons, with a big reddish orange bow on her chest with a red six pointed star clip on it. She's also wearing a silver belt with a red six pointed star on it, along with a two tiered skirt (first tier red with round ends, second tier white with pointed ends) with burgundy pockets and a white line going across it, red Spanish dancing shoes complete with the red string wrapped around her legs, and white tights. She was also wearing fingerless orangish red gloves with white lines near the ends going up to just above her elbows, along with reddish orange arm bands with red circles on them. Her teal ribbons had been spared. Her red hair suddenly became lighter in shade, looking a lot more wild. In her left ear was a jewel shaped like a red, six pointed star._

_Youko, on the other hand, was a different story. Her curly dark blonde hair had suddenly turned snow white, with a big white flower hair clip on the back of her hair with two big green leaves protruding out from it. She also had a pink flower hair clip on her bangs, also with two little green leaves protruding from it. She was wearing a white shirt with matching white lace going across the front, with white flower shaped buttons. She was wearing a white ribbon on her chest with a white flower shaped clip on it, white scrunchies beneath her shoulders, and string wrapped around her arms. She was wearing a silver belt with a white flower shaped jewel on the front, a flowery, poofy white skirt, white socks that go up to her knees with pink flower and green leaf decorations on the top, and silver and white shoes with white ribbons that have white flower clips on them._

"_I am the light that pierces the night, Cure Daylight!" Hinata, now cure Daylight, proclaimed proudly while striking a pose._

"_I am the light whose golden effulgence radiates the Earth! Cure Sunlight!" Youko, now Cure Sunlight, proclaimed passionately as she struck a pose._

"_Together we're Pretty Cure!"_

"_Uhh...what just happened?" Youko asked, looking very confused._

_"What was all that stuff we just said?" Hinata was just as confused as Youko was._

_Malgorzata just stood there, as her jaw ungracefully fell off of the top of her mouth, unable to comprehend what just happened before her eyes. "Pretty Cure…?"_

(end flashback)

"And then what?" Moonbeam asked.

"Yeah! I wanna hear more!" Sunbeam exclaimed excitedly.

"At first, I couldn't believe what just happened. But I read the note some more and learned that the Pretty Cure are heroes who are needed when the time called for them. When strange things began happening on Earth, Youko and Hinata found out about it. I knew they were needed, but I was scared to let them go back to the place that had deprived them of what they loved," Malgorzata explained.

(flashback)

"_Queen Malgorzata! Please! Let us go to Earth!" Cure Sunlight pleaded with desperation in her eyes before the Queen, sitting on her throne with a worried expression._

"_I cannot let you do that! The situation is dangerous enough as it is! I refuse to let you put yourselves in danger!" Queen Malgorzata yelled, standing from her throne and swinging her hand._

"_But your knights might not be enough to defeat them!" Cure Daylight piped in. "Please! The people on Earth need us!"_

"_Absolutely not!" Queen Malgorzata proclaimed. "You two are very precious to me. Earth hasn't been kind to you. With the way things are now, I can't bear to lose you two! It's dangerous down there, especially with the person who has the Energia wreaking havoc, whoever he or she is!"_

"_That's exactly why we should go, Queen! Earth is where we came from! Don't get us wrong. We're very grateful for everything you and everyone else did for us. Really, we are! But…" Cure Sunlight balled one of her fists. "There's a reason why the Heart Lighters resonated with us and turned us into Pretty Cure! This might be it! The Earth needs heroes, people who can defeat those monsters!"_

"_Cure Sunlight is right, Queen Malgorzata. We can't just sit here and do nothing, especially since we have powers nobody else can get!" Cure Daylight echoed Sunlight's argument._

"_Even if you are Pretty Cure, you don't know how to use your powers fully yet. I don't want you getting reckless, because that's what leaves you open to getting hurt or even killed, and you two were already close to crossing the thresholds to death when I first found you both! Whoever this person is, he has the Energia, and he has powers that no human being should ever possess. He or she can do whatever he wants with it, from warping reality to committing worldwide genocide! You are not aware of the repercussions such a person can create, and I don't want you putting your lives on the line because of a mistake," By mistake, she meant the person dropping the Energia by accident, leading to its discovery._

"_We know that! But who else can stop him or her? We have to do something!" Cure Daylight argued. "Don't you care about the people on Earth?!"_

_Malgorzata stopped talking when she said that. She looked down at her Native American style dress. They raised some very valid points. She knew very well the dangers their going to Earth could bring. But in a way, she saw no point in trying to stop them. Their minds were made up. She closed her eyes, remembering the times she met them. They were just helpless little girls, lost in a world that had abandoned them, unable to get by, who could have died had they not been saved. Now, they've blossomed into strong women, and it seems the world did need them. "You two aren't the same children I saved from Earth. Alright. I'll let you two get the Energia back. But I have one question for you...when you go to Earth, are you going to live there from then on?"_

"_We're thinking about it, but we're not sure yet. But we do want to live in the planet we came from. We dearly love Rozaniela and all, but there's lots of things we can learn from Earth. We want to try living there and seeing what it's like to be on our home planet," Cure Sunlight explained calmly._

"_If you wish to live on Earth after this is over, I won't stop you. However, life on Earth is very different from life on Rozaniela. It is more technologically advanced than we are, and there is more despair and hardship to face. The humans on Earth are very harsh and judgmental. I'm afraid you won't be able to adjust very well," Queen Malgorzata explained._

"_Queen, we'll do everything we can to get the Energia back!" Cure Daylight exclaimed._

"_I see. Then go to Earth. The people there need you. From what my messengers have been telling me, the monster attacks have been taking place in the country called Germany," Queen Malgorzata explained, showing them a map of Earth, pointing to where Germany is._

"_But we don't speak German!" Cure Sunlight piped in._

"_Just focus on getting the Energia back with as little loss of life as possible," Malgorzata told them._

"_You can count on us, Queen Mal!" Cure Daylight said. Both she and Cure Sunlight, with the Queen's help, teleported to Earth to find the person with the Energia and take it back._

"_Bye bye!" The girls said, waving before being teleported away._

(end flashback)

"What happened next? Did you get it back?" Kyoya asked excitedly, eager to know more about the heroic, valiant exploits of the first Pretty Cure.

"Yes, they got the Energia back. But they didn't give it to us in person. They gave it to Gideon, who accompanied them to Earth for their safety. He gave it to me before going back to Earth. As it turned out, the girls decided to live on Earth after all. I haven't seem them or Gideon ever since," Malgorzata explained. "I have no idea where on Earth they are. But I'm sure they're living their own lives and doing well."

"Thanks a lot for telling us all this. This has been very enlightening," Hotaru told her politely with a bow.

"Yeah! The first ever Pretty Cure...I'd love to meet them some day," Marina said with a smile.

"We should definitely tell Riko about this," Anzu piped in cheerfully.

The Queen smiled. "I'm glad. In fact, if you want, you can go home now. You did a good job finding whatever information we could get."

"You're welcome. Sorry we couldn't find out more," Lovebeam said.

"You know, An-chan, I saw a picture of Youko-san once, and you actually look a lot like her, only her hair was curly," Sunbeam explained.

"I do?" Anzu asked.

"It's alright. This isn't an easy task, after all. But once we decipher the archives, we'll be able to learn everything we need about the Energia and how to stop Zenjin. You'd best be going now. I don't want your parents to worry," The Queen said gently. The kids and fairies decided to teleport back to Earth to tell Riko everything they heard about Cures Sunlight and Daylight.

* * *

"I am sooooo tired!" Beileag complained as she plopped onto her tacky purple and pink comforter. Her purple and green hat fell right off her head and onto the pillow.

"Based on your display of exhaustion and your demeanor, I take it you were unsuccessful in finding information," Decebal piped in as he came into her room, combing his green hair.

"You read me like a map, Decebal," Beileag said, her voice muffled by the thick and heavy comforter she was lying on. "I wish we had more to go on! I know Zenjin doesn't remember much because of the abuse he endured, and I get that, but, like, seriously, I wish he at least knew the woman's name! Or the name of the school he went to!" She complained, taking her glasses covered face out of the comforter.

"It's very frustrating, yes. It doesn't help that Zenjin can't read or write for the life of him, not even basic katakana," Decebal said as he twirled one of his green curls with his glove covered finger.

"I know he said he didn't go to school for very long," Beileag piped in as she clutched one of her flower shaped pillows. "Where is Zen-chan anyway?"

"He went to look for information himself," Decebal replied, combing his hair some more.

"I hope he doesn't blow anything up. The police might chase him and put him in jail."

"Zenjin's strong. He won't go down so easily," Decebal said. "He was a wild thing, even when we first met him."

(flashback)

_Decebal and Beileag, slightly younger, met with King Ghislain in the waiting room of a hospital. "You sent for us, Your Majesty?" Decebal asked with Beileag trailing behind him._

"_I apologize for calling you out here so suddenly," The King explained. "The boy is faring much better since you and I have saved him, Decebal."_

"_He is, huh? That's good," Decebal said with a smile._

"_But there is something I want to discuss with you. My wife and I would love to raise him ourselves, but we don't have time for children because of the gravity of our duties," King Ghislain explained again._

"_What does that have to do with us?" Beileag asked._

"_Well...it makes me feel awkward to ask you this, but...I've called you here...to ask if you two can...take on the responsibility of taking care of him," King Ghislain explained, stumbling a bit before bowing._

_Decebal and Beileag let his question sink in for a bit. Then Beileag screamed. "Ehhhhhh?! But...Your Majesty! We're too young to be adoptive parents! Plus we have our acting careers! I don't want to give it up! I live for acting and frolicking in the spotlight-"_

"_We'll do it!" Decebal announced._

"_WHAT?!" Beileag yelped. "You wanna do it?!"_

"_You'll do it?" King Ghislain asked, wondering if he heard right._

_Decebal put a palm on his heart and bowed lightly. "We would be honored to take on this responsibility, Your Majesty. I had been planning to take a leave of absence from the troupe anyway."_

"_I don't want to get in the way of your acting careers. I know your troupe is very important to you, but I don't have anyone else to rely on. I don't want the boy to fall through the cracks," King Ghislain told them with a pained look on his face._

"_There's no need to worry, Your Majesty. Beileag and I will take full responsibility for him and care for him as though he is our own," Decebal told him kindly._

"_Hey! I didn't agree to this!" Beileag shouted, not keen on the idea._

"_Beileag. The boy needs a mother in his life. I know you love acting and all, but they say a little pain comes with any good fortune," Decebal said. "We're living under the same roof after all, so you might as well suck it up and deal with it."_

_Beileag crossed her arms and looked away like a petulant child._

"_I really appreciate this. I'll bring the boy in right now," King Ghislain said before going through some doors to get the boy in question._

"_Decebal! Why are you agreeing to this?! Raising a child is hard work! Acting is hard enough as it is! This'll never work!" Beileag exclaimed worriedly._

"_I think having a child around will be wonderful. Besides, maybe it'll teach you to not be such a drama queen," Decebal told her._

"_But we don't know what this kid is like. What if he's a prankster or a big time trouble maker?!" Beileag yelped._

"_We'll deal with it. This'll give us some new experiences," Decebal replied pertly._

_Soon, King Ghislain came back into the waiting room, holding the left hand of a very young, spindly looking little boy, with long, neck length crimson hair. He was ten years old, but if one didn't know better, they'd assume he was seven or eight years old. Both of his arms and legs were thin like sticks that would break under even the lightest amount of pressure. His eyes-a neutral shade of chocolate brown-had absolutely no life in them. No spark, no light, nothing. It was as though all the life had been sucked right out of them, shut off like a light switch. His left eye was covered with a white eyepatch, and his head had some gauze wrapped around it. His right arm was in a cast from shoulder to palm, leaving his fingers mobile. His right ankle was wrapped in bandages, going right up to his knee. There are some bandages on his left arm, covering some small scratches. Decebal kneeled before him._

"_Hello there," Decebal told the boy. "I'm Decebal, and this is my friend Beileag," He pointed to Beileag, who shyly waved at him. The boy said nothing. "Would you like to come live with us?"_

_The boy said nothing._

"_He hasn't told us his name yet, so don't force it," King Ghislain told them._

_Right after that, they took the boy to their humble home, a house which Decebal had recently bought some months ago. It was a small little place, but big enough to fit two adults and a small child in there. It was a pale, sunny shade of yellow, with a white roof and some windows with white shutters. They escorted Zenjin to what would be his room. It was a little small, with white walls, a light brown dresser and a bed with a sky blue comforter on it, but it seemed to suffice. _

_The crimson haired boy said absolutely nothing during his first days here, even when he seemed to move around and do whatever it was he needed to do, like eat, go outside, go to the bathroom, etc. Beileag had to admit, she was happy he hasn't caused any trouble or broke anything. One day, the boy sat on the grass in their backyard, staring at nothing in particular._

"_So...what's your name?" Beileag asked._

_The boy said nothing._

"_I have to call you something. I can't just call you _'boy,'_ 'cause that's rude," Beileag added._

_Much to her surprise, she saw the boy's lips move._ _"Ze…"_

"_Hm?" Beileag cocked her head to one size, her lavender eyes lighting up with curiosity behind those pink, heart shaped glasses of hers._

"_Zenjin."_

_As soon as the boy said his name, he seemed to gasp a bit, like he never heard his own voice before in his whole entire life. The boy surprised not only Beileag, but himself. It was rather monotone and breathy, and not very loud, but still had a touch of squeakiness, like he hadn't reached puberty yet. He made a twisted face like he didn't like it._

"_So you're Zenjin, huh? Mind if I call you Zen-chan for short?" Beileag asked, happy to know his name._

_The boy, Zenjin, nodded._

_However, as happy as she was to be able to call him by his name, as the weeks went by, some problems began to arise. When his arm healed, Zenjin, as he adamantly preferred to be called, suddenly spent his days in really bad moods, constantly going off to wherever he pleased, throwing things all over the house, breaking things, stamping his feet, and screaming wildly._

"_Zenjin! Stop!" Decebal yelled as he watched Zenjin scream while throwing a glass cup to the floor, causing it to shatter into shards. But Zenjin didn't stop there. He picked a chair up and threw it across the dining room. Decebal wasn't in the way, so he was spared. But still, he and Beileag had to wonder just what is going on with the boy. _

_Beileag realized she spoke too soon. He didn't seem to aim for anyone in particular when he had these episodes. He just threw stuff and broke stuff just for the sake of doing it. He didn't hurt anyone, thank goodness. But his violent tantrums brought on more problems: he refused to eat or drink anything. He wouldn't take a bath. Worst of all, one day he fell sick with a fever, which didn't prove to be anything serious. But the boy made things difficult by screaming and refusing medicine, but they managed to get it in his system anyway._

_Thankfully, in the days that followed, Zenjin shrugged off both the cold and the violent phase, and seemed to respond better to Decebal and Beileag._

(end flashback)

Decebal looked up at the ceiling of the fortress with solemn, cherry red eyes. "We'll find you. We'll go to the ends of the Earth to find you," He muttered to himself.

* * *

**Author's Note: I changed some present tense to past tense, broke up a lot of paragraphs, made Cure Sunlight a little chubby, deleted the final two scenes of this chapter. I'm working on planning out new versions of chapters 19 and 20 so I can address Anzu's family problems in a more sensitive way. Hope this helps!**


	23. New Friends and The Math Test!

Chapter 22: A tough day! Friendships, rabid fan clubs, and the math test!

The doors of the previous day closed, allowing a new day to open theirs. But the day started early for those who go to Hikaribashi High School. "Uuuuugh! I wish they didn't make us wake up early just to get here!" Hikage groaned, the side of his face squishing against the cold, hard surface of his desk.

"I agree. It can be quite tiring for some," Hotaru chuckled sweetly as she turned a page in a relatively new copy of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's _The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes_. Hikage couldn't help but notice that some of the pages on Hotaru's book had some corners bent.

"Yeah. It doesn't help that we have a science test today and I have basketball practice," Hikage moaned again.

"Did you study?"

"Yeah, but I don't know if all the info is gonna stay in my head. I suck at studying. My little sister's way better at it than I am."

"Just do your best and you'll be fine."

"You're just saying that because you ace science like it's nothing!"

Hotaru didn't say anything in response to that, but she could tell he appreciated her well intentioned encouragement. She did, however, notice a girl sitting up from looking toward them with curious, sparkling, ocean blue eyes, just like Hotaru's, but with a slightly darker tint to them. The girl's hair is perfectly straight and a neutral shade of brown, like Hikage's hair, but it's curled at the ends, and it's slightly lighter, with some highlights. The girl turned back around as soon as Hotaru glanced at her. Although curious, she went back to her novel, as it's getting quite good.

"Hey, what's that box you have there?" Hikage asked with his head up this time, pointing to a doll-sized, rectangular box lying next to Hotaru's bag.

"Do you mean this?" Hotaru asked as she picked the box up and put it on her desk. "This is a little planetarium projector I just finished making."

"Wow. That sounds cool. I didn't know you made those," Hikage said with a smile.

"This is the only one I made. I'm planning to start an astronomy club soon, and I thought maybe if it ever got approved, this would be perfect to have around during meetings," Hotaru explained.

"Sounds cool! I'd join, but I have basketball practice," Hikage said, wishing he could hang out with Hotaru more.

"It's quite alright."

When Hotaru's study hall period came, she asked to go to the guidance office to get the forms she needed to start a club. The teacher gave her a pass and let her go. Hotaru walked through the empty halls contentedly with the box in her hands, noting some passing students here and there. She was about to get to the guidance office door until she stopped in her tracks, feeling a sense of woe overtake her. It hit her right then and there: she had to have a decent amount of friends if she wanted to start a club. Hikage was her friend, but he has basketball practice, and he doesn't share her passion for stars, even though he supports her all the way. With that revelation in mind, Hotaru walked away from the guidance office.

On her way back, she noticed one of the science rooms was empty, complete with the door ajar. Normally she doesn't do this, but on impulse, she went inside. The curtains were closed, so if the lights were switched off, the room would be completely dark. _'This'll be perfect to see if my projector came out well!'_ Hotaru thought. She opened the box and pulled out a small, round planetarium projector.

She turned off the light switch, causing the brightly lit room to suddenly become darker than a cave, save for a small crack in the door that's slightly open. She turned on the switch to her projector, and immediately all sides of the room had balls of light dotting it all over, in varying sizes. Hotaru's ocean blue eyes sparkled. Her project is a success! She smiled happily and watched as the little pseudo-stars she made dotted the dark classroom, like she really was in some part of the universe, flying amongst the stars.

Before she knew it, the door flung open, causing the room to brighten up a bit. Not only that, the light switch was flipped, lighting the room back up. With a gasp, Hotaru turned off her planetarium projector and turned to the source, which turned out to be the brown haired girl from her homeroom. The girl was wearing a yellow shirt underneath a dark blue jean jacket, a jean skirt of the same color, white tights, and tall dark brown, lace up boots. The girl's eyes were wide and mouth agape.

"Oh! Sorry! I didn't mean to scare you! I thought the room was empty," The girl said apologetically. Once Hotaru calmed down, she shook her head.

"No no, it's alright," Hotaru replied. The girl then noticed Hotaru's planetarium projector.

"What's this thing?" The girl asked curiously, coming closer.

"Oh, this? I made it. It's a planetarium projector," Hotaru explained.

"Really? I didn't know they could be made this small!" The girl said, awed by the little machine.

"Here, I'll show you how it works," Hotaru said as she turned off the lights in the classroom and closed the door. She made it back, turned on the switch on the projector, and the many dots of light returned in their full glory. Both Hotaru and the girl were awestruck, their blue eyes wide and bright with awe.

"Wooow...this is beautiful!" The girl said, captivated by the sight.

"I know, right?" Hotaru agreed.

"Oh! Umm...would your name happen to be Minamigawa Hotaru by any chance?"

"Yes, it is."

The girl clasped her hands together. "I knew it! In case you're wondering, my name's Kanai Sasami! We share a homeroom!"

Hotaru shook her hand gently. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Kanai-san."

"What are you doing in here anyway?"

"I thought about starting an astronomy club, but I don't have enough members. I just sort of came in here to see if my projector worked."

"Looks like it does now. Oh! I happen to like astronomy, too! Hey! How about this!" Sasami exclaimed happily, her ocean blue eyes twinkling enthusiastically. "How about we start an astronomy club together?! I have some friends who are also astronomy geeks, and this might be the perfect room for the club to be in! Plus…" Sasami began happily, then calmed down a bit. "I've kinda been wanting to be friends with you for a while now. I just never got the courage until now."

"That sounds like a wonderful idea, and I'd be delighted to be your friend," Hotaru replied. Although she was keeping a calm demeanor, she felt like bursting into song. A female friend, at last!

Sasami cheered and jumped up and down happily. "Yeehee! This is, like, so great! Oh! How about we exchange cell numbers?" Sasami turned on the light in the classroom, grabbed a paper and pen from her pocket, and wrote down her number. She tore it off and handed it to Hotaru. "Here!"

"Thanks. Here's mine," Hotaru took the paper and pen and wrote down her own cell phone number. When finished, she handed it to Sasami.

Hotaru kept a calm face, but she couldn't believe it. She's actually exchanging phone numbers with someone! She felt as though she wouldn't want to trade places with an angel. Unfortunately, the happy glow that creeped into her chest suddenly disappeared when a loud noise caught the duo of girls quite off guard.

"Sasami-sama! We have found you at last!" A quartet of four boys of varying sizes stormed into the room, wearing matching light blue jackets, white headbands that read _WE HEART SASAMI-SAMA_ with an actual red heart drawing between the words _WE_ and _SASAMI_, and light blue pants.

Sasami facepalmed. "Great! Just what I need! My annoying fan club!"

"You have a fan club?" Hotaru asked.

"What's this?! Is someone approaching you in an unsavory manner?! Save our beautiful maiden from her clutches!" The bearded leader yelled loudly, his voice ringing throughout the classroom.

Sasami slammed her fist onto one of the desks and stood up in alarm. "Will you just GO AWAY?! God, you're all so annoying! She's my friend! She isn't doing anything bad to me! Stop believing everything you hear and-WAAAH!" Sasami told them off like it was nothing, but not only did they not listen, they took her and dragged her away from the empty room, leaving a very confused Hotaru all alone with her planetarium projector.

* * *

That was what happened at the high school. At Hikaribashi Middle School, on the other hand, something more appropriate and academic was taking place. Riko stormed into her classroom for math class and poured over her remaining math notes one more time, hoping these blasted equations would stay in her head. Next to her, Fukiko was also staring at her math notes.

"You ready for the math test?" Fukiko asked.

"No," Riko replied, not taking her eyes off of her papers for one second.

"Me either. But you'll probably get a better grade than me," Fukiko told her reassuringly.

"Alright everyone! Take your seats! I'll pass out the tests now!" Their math teacher, Mr. Ikari, called out as everyone got in their seats. He was a relatively young man with a nice, kind face, brown eyes, lighter brown hair, and a little birthmark on his chin. As the teacher began passing the tests out, Riko found herself frozen in her own anxiety. "This test counts against 20% of your grade. If I catch anyone cheating, you'll either fail or get detention with me!" Mr. Ikari exclaimed.

Riko shrugged to push the gnawing anxiety out of her system. This is no time to be scared. She knew she had to take this test. She studied really hard for it over the past few weeks. She took her purple mechanical pencil and immediately started on the first problem, which proved to be easy enough. On the later ones, she did stop a little to think about what to do, but once she got it, she wrote down whatever equations she remembered, solving them to get the answers.

She did stumble on some problems, but she knew she had to solve them. She didn't have time to waste. This time needed to be used productively, so she continued on. The good thing was, there weren't any word problems. Riko let out a sigh of relief. _'Thank goodness. I hate word problems,'_ She thought, happy that there weren't any this time. She did see some extra credit problems and solved them. With the test complete, she handed the paper to Mr. Ikari, pulled out one of her Moomin books and began reading it.

"You're finished?" Fukiko whispered. Riko nodded silently. "Lucky. I haven't gotten past problem fourteen yet," Fukiko said again, but she noticed Riko was quite absorbed in her book. She took it as a sign to keep quiet so she doesn't get in trouble, so Fukiko went back to her test.

Later, some other kids began turning in their test papers. Fukiko finally completed hers and turned it in, relieved that it was finally over. When the bell rang, the kids scrambled to the cafeteria. What Riko didn't know was that her Moomin book slipped out of her hand and onto the floor. Thankfully, someone picked it up.

At lunch, Riko showed Kyoya, Anzu, Marina, and Fukiko some test papers she got back last Friday. A spelling test had a red 110 percent written on the top in red pen. A social studies test (There's no health class anymore. It got replaced by social studies in the past two weeks) had a red 91 percent written on the top in red pen. Finally, a science test had the number 87 written on it in red pen. Riko looked shy and sheepish as she showed her awestruck friends her tests.

"Wow, Riko-chan! You sure are smart! An A+, an A-, and a B+? I wish I was as smart as you!" Anzu exclaimed happily.

Riko's face turned red. "It's not that big a deal."

"Not a big deal? Riko-chan, you should be happy! I'm only able to get B's and C's except in social studies," Fukiko chirped happily, her hazel eyes sparkling. "I think you'll pass this math test for sure. I know for a fact I failed hard. I can't do math to save my life!"

"She's right. You're smart, and you should be proud of that," Marina told her, with Kyoya nodding in agreement.

"Thanks…" Riko muttered shyly, wondering if she deserved all this praise.

Unfortunately, Yoshie and her clique sat some tables away from them. Despite the noise, they could see and hear Riko's gang just fine. Yoshie couldn't help but stare at them with a scornful expression. "Just look at her! Showing off those test grades like she's all that! She thinks she's soooo smart! She's so full of herself!" Yoshie exclaimed scornfully, unable to believe someone like Riko could pass those tests.

"My mom's gonna kill me if she finds out I didn't study for the math test!" Shizuka exclaimed with a worried tone in her voice.

"You hardly ever study for anything, Shizu-chan," Toshiko piped in. "You didn't even do anything at our study group last night. All you did was eat all the cupcakes my mom made."

"Which are sooooo good!" Shizuka piped in, her mouth watering, which made Yoshie and Toshiko look at each other, confused as to why they have someone like her as a friend.

"I'm just so sick of hearing about it! _'Oh, Riko's so smart! Oh, Riko's so nice! Oh, Riko is suuuuuch a good friend!'_ Gimme a break! She's nothing but a little idiot! Someone's gotta give her a very hard reality check!" Yoshie complained.

"Sorry, but count me out. I promised my parents I'd stay out of trouble from now on," Toshiko said.

"Anyway, how'd you do in the math test, Kyoya?" Anzu asked curiously.

"It wasn't hard," Kyoya replied.

"You're really good at math. I wish I was as good as you," Riko said.

"Is it possible to retake tests?" Marina asked.

"Last I checked, yeah," Anzu piped in.

"They let you retake tests here?" Riko asked.

"Uh...yeah? Why? Did your other schools not let you do that?" Kyoya asked, confused.

"I dunno," Riko replied. "By the way, did you read the Moomin books I let you borrow?"

"Yeah! I really like them!" Kyoya exclaimed happily.

"You do?"

"Of course! I'm gonna convince Mom to find me my own copies on Amazon on my next birthday! Let me know when you bring Moominland Midwinter sometime!"

Riko nodded, finding an infectious smile taking over her face. She never thought she'd see the day where she'd ever have someone to talk about Moomins with. Sure, she got to do so with that homeless guy she met at the soup kitchen. Takayuki, was it? She wished she could see him again so they could talk more. But she felt content upon finally having someone to talk about her all time favorite book series with. To Riko, it was like a dream come true, and she doesn't want to trade places with an angel. About a few tables away, Daizo smiled sweetly at the gang, happy that they were back to being the merry group of friends they were known for being.

* * *

At around the same time… "Hey! Hotaru-chan!"

In Hikaribashi High School's cafeteria, Hotaru and Hikage turned around to find a cheerful Sasami behind them. "Oh! Sasami-chan! I never knew you had the same lunch period as me!"

"Hey! You made a new friend? Congrats!" Hikage told her happily.

"Thanks," Hotaru said.

"Do you mind if I sit with you?" Sasami asked.

"Not at all! Come sit with us!" Hikage added enthusiastically, happy to have found a new friend. Sasami sat down at the table, all smiles, with her face radiant like the sun. "I hear you're quite popular."

Sasami sighed. "It has its pros and cons," She said sheepishly. Hotaru noticed that she looked a little sad when she said that, like she wished she wasn't popular. But then again, she had seen her be surrounded by lots of people ever since the school year started. There wasn't a day where Hotaru didn't see Sasami have huge piles of love letters falling out of her locker, Sasami being surrounded by guys and girls who were just as popular as she, people praising her up the wazoo like she was some kind of goddess, and guys fawning over Sasami and dreaming about asking her out.

"You're Tasogare-san, right?" Sasami asked.

"Yep! Tasogare Hikage!" Hikage introduced himself politely as Hotaru ate a slice of her meat sandwich and some green grapes.

"She's going to help me start up an astronomy club," Hotaru told Hikage.

"That's great!" Hikage exclaimed and gave her a pat on the shoulder. "See? I told you you'd find some friends someday!"

"I have a bunch of friends who are astronomy geeks, but we hardly share any classes together. But I told one of them about the club and she's totally on board. Plus, she knows someone who'll be a great advisor for the club and is gonna tell her about it soon," Sasami explained. "I told her about your planetarium projector too."

Hotaru's face turned red like the flesh of a tomato. "Did you? You...really didn't have to…"

"Don't be so modest!" Sasami exclaimed. Hikage smiled. He found Sasami's cheerfulness and enthusiasm to be quite endearing, and he could tell Hotaru was blossoming quite a bit because of her.

"So what do you like to do in your spare time?" Hikage asked kindly.

"Me? Well...I really like jogging and going to the movies and-WAAH!" Sasami wanted to tell them more about her hobbies and interests, but all of a sudden, her fan club suddenly yanked her away from the lunch table, prompting Hikage to stand up in alarm.

"Hey! Leave her alone!" Hikage yelled at the four guys.

"Sasami-sama deserves better than to associate with lowly commoners!" One of Sasami's fan club members exclaimed. Hotaru gave them an icy glare.

"Yes! Lovely Sasami-sama should hang out with cool people-" Before the small guy could finish, Sasami, her ocean blue eyes blazing and her teeth grinding, quickly slapped the guy across the face, freeing herself from their grasp.

"Leave me alone, you numskulls, and do NOT make fun of my friends! Just go away! Please! I'd rather hang out with them than you idiots any day!" Sasami yelled at the top of her lungs.

"See?! Our beloved Sasami-sama is being corrupted by the loser syndicate!" A muscular guy exclaimed.

"Let's go sit somewhere else," Hikage suggested. Sasami and Hotaru followed suit as they left the cafeteria, leaving the intrusive and annoying fan club alone to make a big scene. When they got out, Sasami let out a groan.

"I didn't know you had a fan club," Hikage piped in.

"They're more like stalkers than anything. They follow me around everywhere I go and don't even let me hang out with anyone who I want to be friends with! They harass me every single day and won't leave me alone no matter what I do! They only want me for themselves! They won't even let me do what I want, as you just saw, and anyone who dares to interact with me are all enemies to them!" Sasami yelled.

"Have you called anyone? The police?" Hotaru asked.

"At this point, I seriously want to!" Sasami exclaimed. Hotaru could tell by her exasperated demeanor that she's had just about enough of those guys.

* * *

Night draped it's blanket upon the city. Oddly enough, Zenjin sat on top of the roof of a house, contentedly and calmly staring at the starlit sky, watching the dots of light twinkling and shining in the vast midnight blue. No one had ever seen him so calm, so content, so...happy, and happy in a normal way.

"The stars are the only things that are beautiful in this world," Zenjin mused to himself contentedly, losing himself to their stunning beauty. He remembered the times when he could sneak out of his sickeningly clean house, climb on the roof, and watch the stars twinkle in his younger days. To him, those were the only good memories he had. "The night is so peaceful. No yelling, no idiocy, no craziness...it's so quiet. I wish it were like this all the time."

"My God, leave me alone! Can't you take a hint?!" A girl's voice suddenly permeated the peaceful silence of the night, not only causing Zenjin to almost fall over, but ruining his content state of mind. Zenjin irritably got himself back up, catching the source of the yelling running out of a nearby building.

"Hmph! That idiot's gonna pay for ruining my quiet time!" Zenjin yelled as he made a purple and black swirling ball of energy appear in his hand. With a single throw, he threw the ball at the girl, causing an explosion that drowned out a scream. When the smoke faded, it left behind a girl covered in scratches, and a big pot hole in the street. The angry, hateful silver haired boy descended before the frightened girl, Sasami.

"Who are you?!" Sasami yelled as she got on her feet and pulled herself out of the big pot hole, her ocean blue eyes wide with fear.

"Don't even think about escaping, you trash!" Zenjin growled as he snapped his fingers, causing an orange wall to pop up from the street. Golden ropes wrapped around Sasami and pulled her to the wall. She screamed as loud as she could, hoping someone would hear it and come help her. No one did. It didn't help that some giant mirror thing popped out of her body.

"Oh no!" Moonbeam yelped in Hotaru's room, her ears standing up in alarm. The hairs on every part of her body stood up, and she didn't like how it felt. "Zenjin is nearby! Someone's in trouble!"

Hotaru wasted no time grabbing her ocean blue Heart Lighter. "Pretty Cure, let the light shine!"

After leaping out of her house and transforming into Cure Starlight, she grabbed her cell phone and used the wings on her shoes to fly toward the scene, calling up the other girls to tell them what's going on. Moonbeam stayed close by, following her lead.

Much to Cure Starlight's horror, someone was strapped to a wall.

She was screaming.

Zenjin was sticking his head in her Soul Portal.

She recognized the girl.

"Sasami-chan!" Cure Starlight flew toward Zenjin and unleashed a particularly powerful kick on him, sending him rolling on the concrete. He came out with some bloody scabs on his arms because of how hard the concrete is. Unfortunately for Cure Starlight, a glass orb is in his hand. That told her all she needed to know. She drew out her naginata and pointed it to his face. "Don't you get tired of hurting innocent people for your own sick amusement?"

"Are you kidding? This is what I live for!" Zenjin growled as he flew back in the air, corrupted Sasami's soul orb, and allowed it to turn into a big, skinny, black ermine with bloody red eyes. He growled and flailed his arms around.

"Uuuuugh! Why do these monsters never look threatening?!" With another angry growl, he teleported away.

Already the giant black ermine tried to swat Cure Starlight with it's tail. Cure Starlight put down her naginata and grabbed it just in time. With all her strength, she pulled the ermine off its feet and threw it on the street, taking care to not destroy any nearby houses. Moonbeam shot a beam of purple light at the ermine's face, delaying it's recovery.

"_I'm sick of being popular!"_ The ermine wailed as people began screaming for their lives, running as far away from it as possible. _"Why does everybody want to put me on a pedestal?! I'm not a goddess! I'm just a kid! I want to have friends!"_

Cure Starlight grabbed her naginata. _'Sasami-chan...I'll save you! Just hang in there!'_ Cure Starlight slashed the ermine's neck a few times, not showing any mercy, but it used both of it's arms to catch her naginata at the blade. The black ermine threw away Cure Starlight's naginata, taking her with it, but she used the wings on her shoes to regain altitude so she can launch a long range attack.

"Starlight Shower!" A rain of stars poured on the ermine, but it managed to swat some stars away with it's long tail, two of which actually hit Moonbeam and Cure Starlight, sending them flying toward some buildings.

"You okay, Starlight?" Moonbeam asked with concern peppering her sweet voice as she tried to help Cure Starlight out of the wall.

"I...I think so...but Sasami-chan…" Cure Starlight stammered as she pulled herself out of the hole in the wall. But her leg pulsated, bringing along with it a bolt of burning pain. "I...I have to save Sasami-chan...if I don't...the one hour time limit…"

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!" A flaming arrow shot at the ermine, leaving a big black burn spot on it's belly.

"Twilight Serenade!" A purple ray of light shot at the ermine, knocking it down to the concrete.

"Golden Dawn Explosion!" Cure Dawn flew down from the sky out of nowhere, encased in a golden light, with her nunchucks in hand. Once she made contact with the ermine, a huge dome of light consumed everything within a one mile radius, including Cure Starlight and Moonbeam. But nothing got destroyed, thank goodness. When the light faded, Cure Starlight and Moonbeam opened their eyes to find Cures Twilight, Dawn, and Dusk, along with Sunbeam, Starbeam, and Lovebeam.

"Everyone! You made it!" Cure Starlight cried with relief.

"Sorry we're late, starseeker!" Cure Dusk said with a fist in the air.

"Are you okay? You're hurt!" Cure Twilight came to Cure Starlight's aid, concerned about the scratches on her arms and the developing bruise on her knee.

"It hurts, but I'm fine. We'd best do the finisher move right away," Cure Starlight said.

"I'm ready when you are!" Cure Dawn piped in.

"Me too!" Sunbeam agreed.

"Me three!" Lovebeam agreed.

"Is that an ermine? I've never seen such a creature," Starbeam said before the girls and fairies all held hands.

"Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!"

With their dazzling light, the black ermine finally disappeared into the air, leaving behind Sasami's purified soul orb. Very gently, Cure Starlight took it, ambled over to Sasami's unconscious body, and slowly dropped the orb into the Soul Portal. As soon as the Soul Portal disappeared, the color returned to Sasami's body. With that, the girls went back home to do whatever it is they were doing before hearing about the fight.

* * *

"Nothing again, huh, Decebal?" Beileag asked as she tried on a brand new dress, which was long, flowy, and dark green. Decebal sat on Beileag's tacky purple bed, reading a copy of Shakespeare's Hamlet with his legs crossed.

"Yes. Our search is coming up fruitless. But I won't give up," Decebal said as he got to the part where poor Ophelia loses her mind after her beloved father's passing.

"Oh!" Beileag exclaimed as something entered her mind. "I've been meaning to ask...there's this song that Zen-chan whistles every now and again."

"A song?" Decebal asked, finally looking up from his book, albeit rather irritated.

"Yeah. I'm wondering if maybe you know what it is or the name of it," Beileag said.

"Do you know how it goes?" Decebal asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Hmmm…" Beileag ruminated for a while. "I can't whistle to save my life, but I know it goes like this. Ahem!" Beileag said before clearing her throat in preparation to sing the song Zenjin sings.

"Laaaa la la la la la lalala la,

Laaaa la la la la la lalala la,

Laaaa la la la la la lalala la, lalala la, lalala la,

Laaaa la la la la la lalala la, lalala la."

Decebal listened intently. As much as he hated Beileag's drama queen tendencies and overall ditziness and cluelessness, he had to admit, she has quite a nice, soft little singing voice. He had to wonder why she hadn't used it more often. It would have offered her a more stable career. "Well?" She asked.

"Doesn't ring any bells," Decebal replied bluntly.

Beileag's head slumped a bit. "I knew it…Oh well. Thanks anyway."

"Be sure not to wear that dress when Zenjin comes home. You know how he hates dresses," Decebal told her venomously.

"I know, I know! Jeez, why can't I do what I want for once?!" Beileag whined.


	24. Bonus 2: Horror Is A Good Getaway Drug

Twilight Pretty Cure

Anzu Chapter: Horror Is The Best Getaway Drug

The first horror movie you saw was the ending to the 1970s version of Stephen King's Carrie.

You were about eight years old back then. You remember it as though it were yesterday: the red paint falling on the girl's head (you didn't find out until later that it was actually pig's blood), the objects flying around killing people, the car explosion, the scene where Carrie goes home to take a bath. You didn't get to see the rest of it because your mother turned off the TV quite abruptly, yelling at you for watching something so graphic, amoral, and corrupt, and then going on a rant about how mainstream media is corrupting Japanese youth. You'd rather watch that movie than listen to her go on and on about how corrupt the world is. As if the world isn't messed up already.

It came back on again at night, and you found out that it was called Carrie, based on the popular Stephen King novel. Even though the movie is too mature for little eight years olds to watch, something about it entranced you. But overtime, it wasn't just Carrie that swept you off your feet. You suddenly began looking for other scary looking movies to devour, like Audition, The Exorcist, Child's Play, and Scary Movie. Your dad gave you odd looks when you asked for them in the movie rental places, even more so when he caught you watching them. But you knew for a fact that the movies you were watching aren't real. You know they're just fake, and you know you won't do anything skeevy or violent just because you watched them. Your dad seemed to realize that as well, and left you alone. It's true that you still like anime and kids cartoons like Pokemon, Digimon, Sailor Moon, Pretty Cure, Batman, Spiderman, etc. But there was something about horror movies that really resonated you. They seemed to speak to you in a way you wanted them to.

You turned ten years old when it finally dawned on you: you love horror movies because they reflect your state of mind. They completely represented all the conflicts and terrible feelings that had consumed your heart ever since your mother began keeping you on a very tight and suffocating leash. Horror movies gave your feelings and sadness a voice. A picture. A representation. In your heart, you felt scared, ugly, cut up, and horrified by your crazy mother's overly controlling ways. The wicked mother from carrie was your mother. You were Carrie. But unlike Carrie, you have a loving dad and good friends whom you can confide in, so you know it's not all bad. You also notice something else: you never got sick when you saw these movies. If even your mother's voice is enough to make you sick to the point of vomiting, then how come horror movies don't? You wish you had the answer. But then again, perhaps horror movies could strengthen your stomach. If you can sit through all of these gory and gross horror movies, then maybe you won't get sick whenever your parents fight.

When you went back to school, you told your friends Mitsuru, Urara, and Hikari all about the horror movies you've seen. You don't go in too much detail. You don't want to scare them or traumatize them for life. You know for a fact that Urara is sensitive to those kinds of things. You're surprised to find that they're all okay with your like for them, just as long as you don't do anything bad or try to imitate them. You know you're smarter than that. The only reason you like them in the first place is that they take you away from your mother's tyranny and reflect your terrible feelings of fear, loneliness, hopelessness, and horror at your mother's hand. Everyone has things they like and don't like. You like scary movies, Urara likes cute magical girl and shoujo anime, Mitsuru likes skateboarding and soccer, and Hikari likes dressing up and playing Animal Crossing.

Oh, how you and Hikari adore Animal Crossing! Sometimes when you'd want to get away from all the yelling and the ridiculous accusations, you'd go to her house, and you two would spend hours playing Animal Crossing, buying furniture for houses, exploring new areas, unlocking new secrets, and living on your own in a lively video game world. You didn't care if you forgot to do some homework along the way. Animal Crossing with Hikari is way more fun than boring homework. But then again, even you'd rather do homework than put up with the yelling and your mother's relentless nagging and absurd accusations. Even your dad would much rather play video games with you than deal with his crazy ex-wife who refuses to sign those divorce papers. You show him how everything works and try to get him to understand the mechanics of the game and the console you play it on. He doesn't quite get it, but you're happy he loves you for who you are. She didn't know any other fathers who would rather play video games than deal with the real world.

Sadly, you know reality's going to slap you in the face someday. It definitely did when you and your dad have to move away in order to get away from Reika. He was not content on staying here and letting you get hurt, and he wanted to get you as far away from Reika as possible. As happy as you are with the fact that he cares about your well-being, you're sad to be away from your friends, the people who have stood by you, understood you, and always loved you no matter what. They didn't mind if you liked horror movies, goth clothes, Animal Crossing, listening to bands like Metallica or The Birthday Massacre, kids anime like Pokemon and Sailor Moon, or even playing your harmonica. You wished you could stay with them forever.

But it's like your dad says. No matter what happens, never forget who you are. Oh, you know who you are. You're Chino Anzu. You love horror movies, playing your harmonica, Doctor Who, The Avengers, Animal Crossing, and heavy metal music. You like wearing goth clothes because they're comfy and cool, but you don't identify as a goth. You're you, and nobody should expect you to be what they want you to be, no matter how ardent they are in wanting to change you because they don't like you being you. You're Chino Anzu, and for you and your dad, that's good enough.


	25. The Fairy Festival!

Chapter 23: The Rozanielan Fairy Festival Will Brighten Your Mood!

"See, Zenjin? This is the katakana for _'Sa,'_" Decebal and Zenjin are in the lobby of the fortress, with Zenjin sitting on a big red couch, with Decebal sitting on another one, with a big black obsidian table separating the two of them.

There were lots of papers scattered on the table, each with huge katakana symbols written on them in black. Decebal held up a paper with the katakana for _'Sa'_ on it, showing it to Zenjin, who simply cocked his head to one side like he was having trouble seeing it. On his lap was a dark blue spiral notebook and a yellow pencil in his hand. "Try to write Sa, if you can," Decebal told him.

Decebal could see the _'Sa'_ symbol just fine. On the other hand, it didn't look like much to Zenjin. Just another set of lines. He drew something in his notebook and showed it to Decebal. Decebal put the paper down and looked at the notebook.

As expected, Zenjin wrote Sa wrong. The horizontal line was supposed to go right across the two lines. Zenjin drew the line on the bottom of the paper, making it only go across the longer line, leaving the shorter line all alone. The lines didn't look like straight lines. They were wiggly and clunky, like they were written by a kindergartener learning to write for the first time.

"Try again," Decebal told him, handing the notebook back. Zenjin ripped the page out, crumpled it into a ball, and threw it at the floor. He scribbled something down on another piece of paper. He showed it to Decebal, but again, the green haired man's face contorted.

Although Zenjin got the horizontal line across and on the top this time, he left out the short line completely. "You wrote _'Na,'_ not _'Sa,'_ Zenjin," Decebal told him. With a growl, Zenjin took the notebook and threw it at the wall, barely missing a surprised Beileag.

"Yeek! Hey! Watch it, will you?! You almost hit me!" Beileag yelled.

"I just can't do it!" Zenjin cried angrily, slamming his fist on the little obsidian table so hard that it broke in half, causing all the papers to fly all over the place. "I don't know how you guys can do it! I can't read or write any of this stuff for the life of me! They all just look like meaningless lines to me!"

"I know you can do it, Zenjin," Decebal told him. "You were able to write _'Ni,'_ _'No,'_ and _'Ro'_ just fine."

"Only because they're just lines and a square!"

"Yeah, but it's a start, right?" Beileag said, having calmed down. "Lots of simple things are hard at first, but if you practice a lot and work hard, you'll get it. Maybe not now, maybe not even in the next year, but you'll get it."

"She has a point," Decebal agreed.

"Well, I'm bored! I'm gonna go blow things up!" Zenjin hopped off the couch and stomped away, stamping his feet as he did. Beileag sighed.

"He's, like, the most impatient kid ever," Beileag brushed some of her indigo hair out of her face.

"I agree. He just doesn't like to sit still."

"But if you're here, then I'll happily go through anything!" Beileag chirped happily. "Now where's my new hair clip? It's, like, so beautiful, and it goes with my new skirt!" She went back to her room to find a new hair clip she just bought.

Decebal scoffed as he kneeled down to pick up the papers Zenjin scattered all over the place. "Annoying ditz," He muttered under his breath.

As for Zenjin, he teleported to Earth and flew through a bustling city, irritated by how happy and content everyone looked as they walked from one destination to the next, wherever it was they were going or coming from. He hated happy faces (except Decebal). He hated the sight of people loving their pets, people laughing amongst each other as they talked about something funny, the sight of a woman performing a cute little Snow White themed puppet show for an audience of small children and getting a joyful reception, a man giving a bouquet of flowers to his overjoyed female friend, a pet shop owner showing some little kids a gaggle of kittens that a cat gave birth to recently...the whole sight of it all just made Zenjin want to puke. Not even a guy sitting on a bench grimly reading a newspaper lightened the boy's irritable mood.

'_These idiots think they're so awesome...why should they be happy? They don't deserve to be happy! I'm the only one who should be happy around here!'_ Zenjin he angrily kicked a trash can over, causing it to clatter on the sidewalk, the contents spilling out a little bit. A woman who happened to be passing right by managed to evade the trash spill right then and there. But when she saw Zenjin, she donned a disappointed look.

"Don't you know it's dangerous to do that, young man? Someone could have gotten hurt! Pick this mess up right now!" The woman demanded like she was Zenjin's mother.

"I don't need to listen to you, you old hag!" Zenjin yelled before running off, leaving an appalled woman standing in front of the hapless trash can.

"My! Children these days!" The woman exclaimed as she put the trash can back up. A man noticed the mess and came over.

"Need some help, miss?" The man asked. But he already picked some leftover trash up and put it back in the trash bin.

"Oh, thank you! Some boy just knocked it right over! I almost got hurt! I scolded him but he just ran right off," The woman said, picking up some squished cigarette butts and putting them in the bin.

"There's been a lot of incidents like that lately," The man told her.

Zenjin stamped on the sidewalk, with his gloved fists balled up like he wanted to punch something-or someone. He kicked a stone into an unlit streetlight, knocked a box of potatoes over right in front of a vegetable shop, and spit on the sidewalk. Zenjin hated showing restraint.

* * *

Rina sat in the living room watching one of Riko's Maple Town DVDs with Caroline rubbing against her arm as Riko herself sat at the table to eat her usual breakfast: buttered toast, bananas, and yogurt. When she finished, she prepared her usual lunch. But Saki and Arinao noticed that Riko looked extremely grim, like a light had been turned off.

"What's wrong, Riko?" Saki asked.

"Waagh...Finn Family Moomintroll is gone…" Riko whimpered sadly as she put her food in her lunch box.

"Do you remember the last place you had it?" Arinao asked.

"School."

"Does your school have a Lost And Found, Riko?" Saki asked.

"I don't know!"

"When did you lose it?" Arinao asked.

"Two days ago, the day of my math test," Arinao smiled and put a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Don't be sad. I'm sure someone picked it up. I'll call the school today and ask if they've seen it. If not, we can buy you a new one," Arinao told her calmly and reassuringly, but it didn't seem to work, as Riko ran to her room to get ready.

Riko remained grumpy and sad during the car ride. Rina made sure to keep her mouth shut during this time. Thankfully, Riko's sour and sad mood didn't last very long...and it took a very odd thing to make it go away.

"Tasogare-saaaaan!"

Riko had intended to meet with her usual gang, but someone's familiar voice made her turn around. The voice belonged to Chinami, the amiable girl whom she shares some classes with. Chinami ran up to her and stopped, panting like she ran a marathon. She was wearing a pink shirt, a pink, four-tiered, scalloped skirt, black leggings, glittery pink and white sneakers, pink and white heart themed socks, a silver pearl bead bracelet on her left wrist, and a pink and purple bandana wrapped around her head.

"Phew! I finally caught up with you!" Chinami panted before managing to catch her breath and wipe some sweat off her forehead.

"What's wrong?" Riko asked.

"You dropped this in math class two days ago," Chinami said as she showed Riko a book. The Moomin book she lost. Finn Family Moomintroll. There was no mistaking it.

"My book!" She took the book out of Chinami's hands, held it in the air, and jumped around like she was a rabbit. Some kids laughed, others gossiped under their breath, Marina facepalmed, but Chinami smiled, happy to return the book. "Thank you thank you thank you thank you!"

"No prob. I wanted to give it to you yesterday but I forgot to bring it. I made sure nothing bad happened to it!" Chinami told her. "And...umm...I know it's wrong to go through people's stuff, but…" She said shyly, like she wanted to confess something. "I...I read it when I got back from school yesterday 'cause I was bored…"

"Urk! You did?" Riko croaked, fearing the worst. She read her book? She couldn't believe it. Someone girly and bubbly like Chinami actually read something that nobody but Riko cares about? As nice as she's seen her, Riko couldn't help but have doubts spring forth in her mind like a baseball being thrown through a glass window.

Does she hate it? Is she going to tell her girl posse about it so they can laugh at how babyish it seemed? Are they going to bully her with it for the rest of her life and never stop? Is she going to tell Riko to stop reading such babyish books and grow up? Now she wished she hadn't lost her book.

"...I love it!"

"Eh?"

"I love it! I didn't think I would, but I do! I really do! I love the part where they find the magic hat and the egg shells turn into cotton candy clouds!"

Magic hat? Egg shells? Cotton candy clouds? True, the clouds in the book weren't cotton candy, but Riko found herself flabbergasted. She did read it! Nobody she knew ever got those details right before! Could it be…?

"...I like the part where Tofslan and Vifslan(1) confess to stealing the ruby from the Groke," Riko told her.

"I don't like those little guys. I know they're kids and all, but they annoyed me," Chinami piped in.

"The part where Moomin turns into that purple monster scared me."

"Me too! But he changed back, so that's good."

Riko found herself lighting up. A new friend! One who actually likes Moomins! Yes, it was by accident, but boy was it a happy accident! She was about to pop the question, but Chinami suddenly beat her to the punch.

"Hey! Wanna be friends?"

"Eh?" Again, Riko is surprised, not just by the question coming from someone she never expected, but the fact that she asked it so freely and casually like it was the most normal thing in the world. Riko wanted to decline, but her heart screamed at her not to do so. She was clearly nice, and even got important details about the Moomins right. How could she refuse? "Sure…but...why did you like it? I mean, you look like someone who's more into boy bands, going to the mall, fashion magazines, gossiping, and getting your nails done every day."

"True, except for the gossiping and getting my nails done every day part. But there's nothing wrong with trying something new once in a while. Plus, you've helped me a lot, so I don't see why we can't be friends!" Chinami exclaimed happily.

They wanted to talk some more, but the bell rang, which meant that school has to start. But Riko found her little heart completely aglow with happiness. A new friend! By complete accident! She read her Moomin books and got everything right! Someone like Chinami just HAD to be her friend. There was no way Riko was going to let this chance slip.

Thankfully, fate was on her side, because Chinami wasted no time asking to hang out with Riko's gang during homeroom. At first, they were surprised by her presence, but when Riko told them what happened, they let her in and chatted up a very happy storm. The whole group seemed to light right up.

Riko spent the first three periods in a state of absolute bliss. A new friend! She couldn't wait to hang out with her at lunch and recess. She never did get used to the amazing feeling of making a friend. It was always so new to her. But she didn't mind one bit. She wanted to be happy all day. She couldn't wait to get through the school day and tell her parents, brother, and Hotaru all about it.

Unfortunately for Riko, her warm happiness would be taken away in one fell swoop, and all it took was a set of red numbers on a paper to do it.

In fourth period, Mr. Ikari handed the tests back. Riko prayed that her studying paid off. But as soon as she opened her eyes, a red 69 blared right in her face. A sixty nine. Riko found herself frozen at her desk, unable to move. Her fingers clutched the paper, wanting so badly to crumple it up. Her eyesight blurred. Everything she heard outside sounded like echoes.

"I'm afraid the majority of you didn't do so well…" Mr. Ikari said.

"Awww! I knew it! I knew I'd mess up!" Fukiko complained with her face buried in her arms.

"No way! A 76?! I actually passed?! Yay!" Chinami cheered.

Riko's green eyes grew bigger and bigger until they almost looked completely white. Everything she heard was intelligible. Riko felt like the world ended all around her, and everything that didn't go with it remained, laughing at her for her inability to pass such a simple math test. She studied. She studied hard. She looked over her notes. She took notes in class. She paid attention. How did this happen? She knew she was never good at math, but how could she still fail in spite of studying so much? The echoes Riko heard sounded like laughter. People laughing at her. Just like people did back when she was in fifth grade.

"_Man! Look at that grade! You can't even pass a math test?!"_

"_You should have paid more attention!"_

"_My baby sister is better at it than you are!"_

She saw nothing. She heard imaginary laughter. She felt something poke her. She didn't realize that it was a worried Fukiko tapping her arm. "You okay?" Fukiko glanced at the grade on Riko's paper. "Hey! You got a higher grade than me! See? I got a 54!" Fukiko waved the paper in Riko's face, but it didn't snap her out of her silent trance.

"I...failed…" Riko muttered to herself grimly. Her eyesight blurred, and all of a sudden, she felt something warm and wet dripping down her face.

"Now there is an option to retake the test. I'll be holding make-up exams next Wednesday during recess or after school, so…" Mr. Ikari announced to the class, and wanted to continue on, but a sound that very strongly resembled a slap in the face caught his attention. Then five more, and a scream.

* * *

Arinao sat in the den on his computer, going on a typing spree as his fingers danced across the keyboard at breakneck speed. Words and text in Times New Roman format and 12 point size popped up on the screen in huge numbers. Inspiration kept on striking him like a meteor shower, and he wanted to type all of this down or else he'd never be able to get it back again, or if he did, not in the same way. He typed like the wind, feeling quite energized despite being as still and silent as a mannequin. Little Yumiko pitter-pattered around him, sniffing his legs. After that, she leaped up to put her little paws on his lap.

"Down, Yumiko," Arinao commanded calmly as he typed. Yumiko obeyed his order and sat down. He stopped typing, smiled at the cute little Australian Shepherd puppy with her big brown eyes, and gently stroke her ears. "When I'm done with this one paragraph, I'll take you out for a quick walk. Okay?"

Right as he said that, the phone rang. _Blipblipblipblipblip!_ Arinao pulled himself out of his computer chair, walked into the kitchen, picked up the ringing phone, and pressed the END button.

"Hello?"

Silence.

"Yes, this is her father."

Silence. Arinao's eyes grew large. He didn't like what he heard. "What?!" He yelped.

More silence.

"I understand. I'll come right away."

He hung the phone up and grabbed his car keys and house keys. "Sorry, Yumi. You'll have to wait until I come back," Arinao told Yumiko right before bolting out of the house like it was on fire. He leaped into the car, started it, and drove away from the house. It didn't take him five minutes to get to Hikaribashi Middle School. But he doesn't know where the nurse's office is, so it took him a while to find it on his own. He managed to find it thanks to the wide window on the door which has the word _NURSE_ pasted on it. Quietly, he came into the nurse's office.

"Oh! You must be Tasogare-san. She's lying in bed right there," The nurse showed him the bed where Riko, still crying, but softer this time, is laying. Arinao felt his heart break. He really didn't want to see this sight again.

"What happened?" Arinao asked.

"Ikari-sensei said she started crying and hitting herself after she got her math test back. He had to carry her here," The nurse told him.

Arinao looked down at Riko sadly. "I see," Then he kneeled down and stroke Riko's black hair with his big, rugged hands. "Riko? It's me, Dad. You okay, sweetie?"

"I'm so stupid…" Riko muttered, her broken voice muffled by the pillow she's clinging to. But he heard it loud and clear, and he didn't like it one bit.

"No you're not. Don't say that about yourself, and you should never hit yourself either. You're very smart-" He told her reassuringly in a soft voice, but she cut him off.

"No I'm not! I got a 69 on the math test! That's a big fat F!" Riko pulled her face out of the pillow to look at Arinao. Her face was completely red and puffy like a rotten tomato, her eyes watery from too much crying, her face completely wet, causing the hair on her forehead to be stuck to it like glue. "I studied for weeks and I still failed! You should be mad at me!" Riko shouted angrily, her voice raspy, also from too much crying.

"I'm not mad at you. I know how hard you try. You did your best, and to me, that's okay," Arinao told her as he stroke her hair again.

"No it's not! I'm a stupid kid who can't even pass a math test!"

Arinao's face turned serious this time. "Riko. Don't call yourself names. That's not nice. I wasn't any good at math when I was younger. I got worse grades than you did. You're very smart. You get A's and B's in everything else, and that's fine with me. You shouldn't dwell on what you can't do. You should be proud of what you can do. Besides, I'm sure they'll let you retake it, and with a little help, I think you can pass. Now...would you like to come home or stay here?"

Riko wasted no time answering. "Stay here. I can't miss any other classes."

"I don't mind, but I don't want you crying or hitting yourself again. It's disruptive in class, and I don't want you getting in trouble," Arinao told her.

"Won't I get in trouble anyway? That teacher at Kashino yelled at me just for being around!"

Arinao cringed a little. _'Why is she bringing up that wretched school?'_ He thought, wishing she hadn't. But then again, it's hard for autistic people to forget things, especially bad experiences, so he figured it was understandable. "We're not in Kashino anymore. That's in the past. Things are different now, Riko. People here are more understanding and accepting. But you can't hit yourself in class, or at all for that matter. Can you do that for me?"

Riko looked down at the bed she's lying on, clutching the blanket. "I'll try. I'll probably fail again, though."

"I think what you need is to calm down a little bit. I'll go back home for now, and I'll be back to pick you and Rina up, okay?" With a quick hug and a word with the nurse, Arinao left.

But to be honest, he really wanted to take Riko home and let her relax there. He knew for sure that although she's smart and tries hard, Riko hates school, and fares much better at home after she's had a bad day. But she wasn't sick, and Riko could be quite persistent when she has her mind on something, so as much as he is reluctant, he let Riko stay. But poking his mind was the fear that Riko might end up hurting herself again.

After about a few minutes of calming down and sitting in the quiet and medicinal-smelling nurse's office, Riko looked at the clock and realized math class was over. The bell rang right then and there, and with that, Riko ambled out of the nurse's office and back to the classroom to get her stuff and go right to the cafeteria. She knew for a fact that her friends will definitely cheer her up. They always do. But the classroom is empty sans Mr. Ikari, and although she grabbed her stuff, she didn't get to go to lunch right away.

"Riko? Can I talk to you for a moment?" Mr. Ikari asked in a soft, kind voice that had some worry peppering it.

Riko clutched the handle on her wheeled book bag tightly, already fearing the worst. But without a word, she obeyed his order and stayed in the empty classroom. "Are you gonna yell at me?"

Mr. Ikari shook his head. "No. I'm not going to yell at you."

"Well you should."

"I've seen how hard you work in class and the good grades you got on some of my worksheets. In fact, there's never a day where I don't hear the teachers go on and on about how well you're doing in school," Mr. Ikari told her gently, in a calm voice. "I know a 69 is considered an F by this school's criteria, but you've actually done better than a good majority of the students in class."

Riko really couldn't understand why Mr. Ikari would claim something like that would be comforting. In fact, she found no comfort in that at all. But she didn't dare say that. Then again, she remembered Fukiko saying something about getting a lower grade than her. "You probably weren't paying attention, but you can retake the test."

"No I can't."

"Who says?"

"Me. If I get a bad grade, it stays that way forever. I'll never get better."

"That's not a good way to think, Riko. I've seen the work you do, and I think you can improve with a little help. In fact, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the school has a night program we call Late Study. Students and teachers get together to receive additional lessons and help on homework, but it's more one-on-one than in the noisy classrooms. It begins at five and ends at eight. I think that might be good for you."

Riko thought about contradicting him, but she listened this time. Perhaps he was right. Maybe she could go to this program and get the help she needs. Not only that, it'd give her time away from Rina. True, it'd mean less time for herself, but some things do require sacrifices after all. Plus, she could get help on her homework. As much as she appreciated Saki and Arinao's efforts to help her out, they didn't solve or arrange the problems in the way they're supposed to. "I'll talk to Mom or Dad about it."

"Okay. I'm there most of the time, so I'd be more than happy to help you out. If you want to retake the test, it's next Wednesday either during recess or after school," Mr. Ikari told her with a smile, happy that she's at least considering the option. But his smile faded and he donned a mild but serious look. "But I don't want to see you hit yourself again, Riko. I understand you have some problems that need to be worked on, and I don't hold it against you, but behavior like that is not only disruptive to the class, but harmful to yourself."

"Sorry…" Riko muttered remorsefully.

"It's alright. I know you're a good kid and a hard working student."

"Are you gonna call my parents and tell them what a bad kid I am?"

"No? Why would I do that?" Mr. Ikari asked, confused. He'd never seen such a persistently pessimistic child before.

"Because that's what that teacher did at Kashino! If I did anything at all I'd get yelled at or she'd yell at Mom and Dad, even when I'm not even doing anything bad! _'Ohhh! Your child's soooo bad! You don't discipline her correctly! She doesn't deserve to be in school with that kind of bad behavior!'_" Riko yelled, doing a rather goofy imitation of everything she heard back in the school she hated so much.

"Is Kashino the school you went to before?"

"Only in second grade," Riko replied.

"I think she's wrong. You're a wonderful student. One of my best behaved kids, in fact. I think that's all for now. I have to go to the teacher's lounge. You'd best get to lunch," Mr. Ikari told her.

"Thanks," She muttered shyly.

"You're welcome, dear."

'_I like him. He's nice and understands me,'_ Riko thought as she almost dashed for the cafeteria, but remembered that one of the school's rules was that there's no running or talking in the halls, so she walked there instead.

When she opened the door to the cafeteria, a tsunami of noise poured right out. But she didn't mind. She was used to the noise by now. Thankfully, not only was she greeted by her usual gang of friends, including their newest member Chinami, but they saved a spot for her! Riko took it without a second thought and scarfed down her lunch.

"You freaked everyone out last period," Anzu told her.

"Sorry…" Riko muttered as she finished her water.

"Just because you didn't do so well on a test doesn't mean it's the end of the world," Marina told her.

"Yeah," Fukiko agreed. "You got a way higher grade than me! See?" Fukiko pulled out her test paper. "I got a 54!"

"You can have Kyo-chan help you. He's really good at math. He aced the test like it was nothing!" Chinami suggested.

"Yeah. I don't mind helping you out at all. I kinda like doing it," Kyoya said, giving Riko a gentle pat on the shoulder.

"Have you all been to Late Study before?" Riko asked.

"I've been there a few times," Chinami replied. "It's really helped."

"I'm planning on going tonight so I can get some help and retake the test. My mom'll blow a gasket when she sees this!" Fukiko explained.

"It'll be okay, Ri-chan," Kyoya told her reassuringly. "It's just a math test. One bad grade isn't gonna decide your whole life."

Riko smiled bashfully, grateful for everyone's kindness. "Thanks."

The kids engaged in friendly conversation, which helped ease the atmosphere a bit. Being with her friends helped push away some of the bad thoughts Riko had. Once she found herself calmer than earlier, she made a note to herself to ask Saki or Arinao if they could take her to Late Study tonight. If she needed to improve this grade, she needed to take action. Now. Kyoya was right. One bad grade wasn't going to ruin her whole life.

* * *

"Oh dear..." Hotaru sat at her desk, sighing at the red number fifty four she got on a recent history test. She brushed her hand through her black hair. "I should have studied more."

"What's the matter, Hotaru?" Starbeam asked. "It is very unlike you to be down. Would you care to discuss it with me? If not, that's perfectly fine."

Hotaru didn't mind. She told Starbeam about the bad grade and her own lack of studying thanks to being cooped up with both her naginata practice, Pretty Cure duties, and the fact that she didn't study while she was out with her parents. She just wanted to have fun once in a while. It didn't help that she forgot about the history test in general. "The teacher said I can retake it next week, which is good, but I don't know if I'll be able to find the time, especially with the Corrupt Sentinels running amok."

"If you wish, I would be more than delighted to help you study. I love learning about history, so this will double as a new learning experience," Starbeam told her kindly. "Everyone forgets things sometimes."

Hotaru smiled and stroke Starbeam's ear gently. "Thanks. I'd appreciate it."

After that, Starbeam and Hotaru spent about two whole hours studying some of the Meiji Era. It's leaders, the progression toward a modern outlook on life, the industrial revolution of that time, the military, and foreign relations. Hotaru had to admit, she didn't really like having to learn all of this stuff, since astronomy was more her forte. But she knew she had to know this stuff in order to pass the make-up test, so she kept at it. She did wish she could hang out with Riko, Anzu, Kyoya, and Marina. Hanging out with her friends was much more enjoyable than studying.

Starbeam closed the history textbook. "Wow. Japan's history is very fascinating."

Hotaru stretched both her arms and her legs out. They were getting stiff from too much sitting and not enough movement. "I wouldn't say that. I think your world's history is even more fascinating."

"You think so?"

Right then and there, Starbeam's ComLap suddenly appeared right out of the clip on her bow, shocking Hotaru into almost falling out of her chair. The ComLap's screen blinked rapidly in a white light. "What in the world?!"

"Hm? I wonder who could be contacting me at a time like this?" Starbeam pressed some buttons and an image appeared on the screen.

"Hey! Starbeam! Is that you?"

"Patch?!"

Hotaru leaned in closer. "Who is this?"

"Hey! Starbeam! It's so good to see you!" A green fairy on the screen exclaimed cheerfully.

"My goodness! Patch! The same to you!"

"Huh? Who's that human behind you?"

Starbeam pulled Hotaru in closer. "Hotaru, this is one of Moonbeam's friends. His name is Patch. Patch, this is my dear companion Minamigawa Hotaru. She's also one of the Pretty Cure Moonbeam told you about. She's Cure Starlight.

Hotaru waved sheepishly. "Hello."

"Wooow! That's so cool! Hey! Starbeam! The Rozanielan Fairy Festival is gonna start soon! I already told your sisters about it! Do you wanna come?" Patch exclaimed excitedly. His ears were twitching, his eyes twinkling like stars in a night sky.

"Oh. The Fairy Festival?" Starbeam said out loud.

The Fairy Festival. Starbeam had been so wrapped up in Rozaniela's partial destruction and her Pretty Cure duties that she had completely forgotten about it. Furthermore, she had to wonder why Rozaniela, in the midst of great tragedy, would still even bother holding it.

But even so, she and her family always went to the Fairy Festival. Her parents would take days off from work in advance just so they could go and partake in the festivities. In fact, that was how her parents met. Everyone she knew always loved the festival, and Starbeam herself loved it. Her favorite activity was the star shooting game. It was when someone gave them a gun full of magic and they would have to shoot at the stars to make them twinkle brightly. Starbeam only ever managed to hit some stars fifteen times in her entire life, but seeing those stars she hit sparkle in the night made her feel like she accomplished something big.

Oh, how she yearned to be able to go again.

"I'd love to go. But I don't know if we will be permitted to do so. We have our duties to fulfill with the Pretty Cure, and if we left Earth unattended, Zenjin would most likely use this opportunity to strike," Starbeam explained sadly.

Patch's ears drooped a bit. "I see. Well, if you can't, that's okay. Talk to ya later! Bye!" With that, Patch signed off.

"Oh. I didn't know your planet had festivals," Hotaru piped in.

Starbeam nodded. "We do. I'd love to take you and the others with me. But we don't want your parents to worry."

_"Starbeam?"_

The ComLap started up again. This time, someone else was contacting them. "Queen Malgorzata?" Starbeam's eyes widened.

"Hello, dear!" Malgorzata exclaimed with a warm, welcoming smile. "I'm on my way to Earth right now."

"How come?" Hotaru asked.

* * *

A little later, the kids and fairies all met in some woods near Riko's house. Malgorzata and Celestia descended before them, looking as regal as ever, before telling them the news. "What! You want us all to come to Rozaniela?!"

Malgorzata clasped her hands together. "Yes. It's such a wonderful time of the year, and I really want you all to come. It's nothing like you've ever seen."

"We'd love to go. Really. But today's a school day, and our parents will get worried," Kyoya explained.

"I actually have a little idea," Malgorzata said. Everyone huddled around and Malgorzata whispered it to them. The kids' eyes lit up.

"That sounds like a neat idea," Riko said.

"Will it even work?" Marina asked.

"Of course it will. I tried it once, and it worked perfectly. Celestia?" Malgorzata snapped her fingers.

With a soft whinny, Celestia waved her horn. It glowed in a soft purple light, shooting into the sky before splitting into four and hitting the kids' houses, Riko's included. "There. The spell has been cast."

"We can't be too long. We have school tomorrow," Hotaru told everyone.

"Well, what are we waiting for?! Let's go!" Anzu cheered before raising her fist in the air. Everyone agreed, wondering what the festival would be like.

They went to Rozaniela as planned. When they got there, the town they teleported to was abundant with life, lights, and a happy atmosphere. Shining, multicolored lights floated all around them. Humans and fairies of all shapes, sizes, and colors swarmed the area, all with happy, excited expressions. Round, paper lanterns in different colors swung in the breeze. A young puppeteer was putting on a cute puppet show for some little kids, only the puppets were moving all by themselves, surrounded by glowing purple auras.

Some musicians were occupying parts of various streets, joyously playing instruments such as zarbs (an Iranian style drum), ocarinas, recorders, xylophones, violins, cellos, etc. The music just radiated warmth and joy. Food stands were giving away a large variety of food such as yakitori, shish-ka-bobs, popsicles, caramel apples, hash browns, popcorn, bananas, ice cream, shaved ice, ribbon candy, chocolate animals, etc.

"Oh! Oh! I want a chocolate bunny!" Riko exclaimed cheerfully, noting that one food stand was selling small packs of chocolate rabbits. She loved chocolate, and hadn't had any in a while. She was craving some sweet, luscious chocolate.

"I'd like some food too, but we don't have any money with us, do we? Do Rozanielans take Japanese currency?" Hotaru asked.

"Actually, yes we do, and I actually happen to have a lot of money on me!" Moonbeam exclaimed before tapping the clip on her bow. A small pink, cherry blossom embroidered bag popped out. Moonbeam opened it and pulled out some pink dollar bills and some pink and red rose shaped jewels with white wings on them. "These bills are called soleils, and these little winged rose jewels are called rosettas."

"Wooow," Everyone found themselves admiring the pink dollar bills and winged rose jewels.

"Your bills are pink," Marina deadpanned.

"They do look pretty cool, though. Pink dollar bills," Kyoya said.

"Can I see a rosetta? Please?" Riko asked.

Without a word, Moonbeam handed the rosetta to Riko. The short haired girl took it in her hand and examined every detail: the foliage of the flower, the sweet pink coloring, the way it sparkled in the festival lights, the small silvery wings. "So pretty."

"You can get a chocolate bunny with one pink rosetta. They're really good," Moonbeam said.

"But I feel like it'd be a shame to spend something so pretty," Riko replied. As much as she liked chocolate, she wasn't sure if she could use something like this as spending money.

Sunbeam got her own bag of rosettas out. "I have plenty, so anyone who wants chocolate, raise your hand! It's all on me!" Only Riko raised her hand. Sunbeam darted off to the chocolate stand and got a chocolate bunny for Riko. "Here ya go!"

"Thanks," Riko said with a bow.

"You're welcome."

Riko opened the chocolate bunny box and bit off both ears. The sweet chocolate melted in her mouth right away, and Riko found herself in love.

Lovebeam tugged on Anzu's arm. "Come on! I wanna show you the tiny rose cakes they have over there!"

"What are those like?" Anzu asked curiously.

"They're super duper good! It's a soft rose shaped candy filled with different cream and it's really good! Come on!" Lovebeam dragged Anzu to the booth selling the rose candy.

"Those sound like they'll rot your teeth," Kyoya joked.

Lovebeam paid two rosettas for a cake and handed it to Anzu. Anzu ate it and she couldn't believe how good it tasted. The pink frosting was soft and melted in her mouth, and the crimson cream inside tasted like sweetened red bean paste. The kids went around eating a bit of food before Hotaru noticed some kids grabbing some rainbow colored guns, shooting white lights at the sky.

"Starbeam? Is that the star shooting activity you were telling me about?" Hotaru asked, pointing to the kids. One girl shot a light at a star, and it twinkled. The little girl jumped up and down, cheering and flapping her hands.

Starbeam's eyes lit up. "Yes it is! You must try it, Hotaru. It is a very merry and jolly activity indeed!"

"Do we need to pay to try it?"

Starbeam shook her head. "You needn't pay any monetary currency to be able to partake in such merriment. But do be careful with those guns. If you point it toward your face and hit the trigger, the light will hit your face and you will end up sustaining severe third degree burns. Not only that, you only get to use the gun three times, no more."

"I promise."

Hotaru asked for a magic gun and the man handed it to her. She signed the contract, ensuring that she would follow all safety precautions and make sure to handle the magic gun safely for its intended purpose. But she did wonder why they even let kids handle those things anyway if they were so supposedly dangerous. Were they being supervised by their parents? Hotaru did see some parents with the kids, so she assumed that was the case.

Upon seeing a star in the sky, Hotaru raised the gun toward it. She pressed the trigger. A light boom went off, and a light shot into the sky. But it didn't hit any stars. Once it got about fifteen feet in the air, the light vanished. Hotaru tried again. It went higher this time, but it still vanished. Last time. Higher, but it didn't hit. Oh well. Hotaru gracefully conceded defeat and handed the gun back. She saw one fairy use the gun and her light managed to hit a star, making it sparkle like a polished jewel. The sight was breathtaking for Hotaru.

"Isn't this such fun? Sure, it's very easy to miss the target, but I always have a blast doing it," Starbeam asked.

Hotaru nodded. "I'll try again next time."

"Heeeeey!" Moonbeam's ears twitched. She recognized that voice.

"Patch!"

Patch flew over to the sisters and the fairies engaged in a happy group hug. "You all look great!" Patch exclaimed happily.

"It's so good to see you!" Sunbeam chirped.

"How've you girls been? It's been pretty hectic here," Patch asked.

"We've been better," Lovebeam said.

"Oh! These are our friends, the Pretty Cure!" Sunbeam introduced the girls one by one to Patch.

"Wooow. That's so cool! It's nice to meet you all," Patch said with a bow.

"The pleasure is ours," Hotaru said with a bow.

"Hey! The Magiquette game is gonna start in a few minutes! Wanna come?" Patch asked.

"Magiquette?! Of course! Wouldn't miss it for the world!" Moonbeam shouted.

Riko cocked her head to one side. "What's Magiquette?"

"It's a game where people in different teams ride alicorns and have to use magic to fly a ball into a chalice," Patch explained.

"Aw yeah! I say we go and watch!" Anzu jumped up once and threw her fist in the air excitedly.

Patch led them all to a grassy area, sealed off by walls made to resemble an egg if one looked at it from an aerial view. The kids and fairies got to sit on top of the walls, alongside many other humans and fairies. There was an elevator so Kyoya was able to join them. Two teams of people riding alicorns appeared on both sides of the pseudo-stadium. A referee threw a silver ball onto the grassy area before blowing a whistle.

One alicorn managed to light up its horn and levitate the ball before the other team could. The alicorn kept passing the ball to its teammates, others managed to grab it, and the teams fought over that ball like crazy. The silver team managed to get the ball in the chalice first. The teams went neck and neck at each other. The audience was silent, and the tension was thick, in a fun way. The gold team got the ball in the chalice this time. Then the silver. Then the gold. They were tied. Who would win?

Finally, after a close call, the gold team managed to get the ball in the chalice again. Everyone burst into jubilant cheers. Pandemonium broke out. Riko joined in on it as well, with her hands over her ears, of course. As loud as it was, watching alicorns play a game like this was actually pretty fun.

The girls left the stadium. "Okay! That was awesome!" Anzu exclaimed cheerfully.

"I know, right?" Moonbeam agreed sweetly. "I loved it when Bruna and her alicorn got the ball into the chalice with just one shot!"

"What about that one alicorn managing to bump that other one! That was rockin'!" Kyoya added with just as much enthusiasm.

"I do kinda wish the gold team had won, though. Leilani's my favorite," Patch said. "But that's okay. It's cool to watch Magiquette games."

"Yeah. We should totally do this again some time," Marina added.

After that, the kids decided to go see other attractions. Riko and Moonbeam got to pet some animals in the petting zoo, young alicorns included. Kyoya and Hotaru went through a little attraction that had blue star covered drapes with plastic glowing stars dangling from the ceiling, making it look like they were walking through space. Some real spheres of light flitted around as well, giving it a more ethereal, magical atmosphere. Anzu got to play a shooting game and won some prizes, some of which she gave to her friends. Sunbeam got herself a little water yo-yo. Lovebeam got first prize in a high striker game. Marina got her face painted. Starbeam had someone draw a picture of her.

Overall, the festival was nothing like the kids had experienced, and they wished they could stay here forever.

"It's almost night, isn't it?" Kyoya asked.

"We should probably get home now," Anzu suggested.

"Fairies? Thanks for bringing us here. It was so much fun! I wanna come here again!" Riko told them gratefully.

"You're welcome. We thought maybe it'd be nice to give you a little break from school," Moonbeam said. "And...since you failed your test, I kind of thought it'd cheer you up and encourage you a little."

"I hope you come and visit again some time," Patch said. "I'd love to hang out with you guys some more."

"We're glad everyone's alright. If you see Mimosa, Flicker, and the gang, tell them we said hi and that we miss them," Sunbeam said.

"I will. Mimosa's still having a hard time, last I heard. But I think she'd appreciate it," Patch said.

After they said their temporary goodbyes, the kids all went home for the day, happy that they got to experience something so magical and out of this world. They wished they could stay here the whole day. Too bad it was a school day, and they needed to get to bed early.

Riko had already finished her homework before they went to Rozaniela, so she didn't need to worry about that. "Riko? This is for you," Moonbeam handed Riko a pink rosetta.

"How come? Isn't this your money?"

"Yeah, but I have plenty more with me. Plus, I know you really like how pretty it is, so consider it a gift from me for being such a great friend...for all this time," Moonbeam said.

A gentle warmth enveloped Riko's heart. Meeting Moonbeam was definitely a big blessing for this girl. With a happy heart, Riko gently embraced her purple bunny friend. "Thank you, Moonbeam. You're the best fairy friend ever."

"You're welcome. You're a great person and a good Pretty Cure. Want to study real quick?"

"Sure."

* * *

**Author's Note: I kept the beginning but cut out Riko's tantrum, cut everything else out and replaced it with some worldbuilding. Hope this helps.**


	26. It's Tough Being the Smart Girl!

Chapter 24: Clean Up Your Own Messes! It's Tough Being The Smart Girl!

"Hey, Beileag!" Zenjin exclaimed in the fortress one day as Beileag sat on the floor, painting her toe nails pink.

"Don't call me that!" Beileag snapped.

"Why do you hate being called that?" Zenjin asked, lying in bed with his legs crossed. His tall red boots were strewn against the foot of the bed, so his pants went down to his ankles, his bare feet exposed for anyone in the fortress to see. "It's your real name, so why do you hate it so much?"

Beileag sighed as she finished painting her middle toe. "It was my mother's idea. In the Rozanielan language, the name Beileag is supposed to mean _"wandering the earth."_ My mother and father never stayed in one place, and we traveled a lot. They named me because they were convinced that I would follow in their footsteps when I grew up. I didn't like that. I wanted to live in one place, make friends, and have a stable career so I'd only have to travel when I wanted to. When I told them I wanted to be an actress, they weren't opposed to it, but they told me that I'm better off living my life without feeling like I'm being chained down," Beileag explained calmly as she painted her long toe.

As soon as she said that, however, a dark look appeared on her normally cheerful face. _'To be honest, now that everything's like this, I actually do feel chained down. I wish Decebal never accepted the king's favor to raise Zenjin,'_ Beileag pondered before saying, "You're quite a hypocrite. It's okay for you to call me by my real name but it's not okay for me to call you by your real name?"

Zenjin sat up on the bed in alarm. "Zenjin IS my real name, and that's a different matter entirely!"

"Zenjin's not your real name, and how is that different from-!"

"That child does not exist and you know it!" He yelled so loudly that Beileag flinched to the point of accidentally brushing part of her foot with nail paint. Smacking his chest once, Zenjin bellowed, "I am Zenjin! I am strong, powerful, and can do whatever the heck I want! I'm not the weak, scared, helpless, vulnerable, pitiful little weakling you and Decebal took in!"

"Yeah yeah," Beileag muttered nonchalantly, ignoring him as she continued to paint her toe nails.

With a yawn, Zenjin got off the bed and stood up. "I need to wake up a little. I'm gonna go look for some info and blow stuff up. Wanna come?"

"Thanks but no thanks. I'd much rather not be responsible for any deaths or have to go to jail. Jail isn't good for my skin! Did you know they don't allow make up products in jail?" Beileag replied, but Zenjin was already long gone before she finished. She sighed again.

"Seems I have the whole fortress to myself. Oh well! Now I can try on some new dresses I just bought!" Beileag said happily as she trotted to her room and tried on lots of new dresses she bought, staring herself in her tall, rectangular shaped mirror.

"Oooh! A little poofy, but the pale green color is very refreshing!"

"This one's my new favorite! It really compliments my hair and eyes!"

"Flashy and stylish!"

After a while, her radiant smile vanished, and it dawned on her that she really was all alone in the fortress. Not a single other life form was in here keeping her company. Wearing a brand new cotton candy pink dress, she sat down on her bed and sighed. She used to be a jar full of life before. Now, without an audience to gaze upon her beauty, the jar was empty.

Beileag plopped on her bed and remembered her fame as an actress in Decebal's troupe. People would gather from all corners of Rozaniela just to watch them perform, but she saw the ones who were smitten by her, who were entranced by her passionate acting, her flair for unconventional styles, her cheerful personality. Beileag loved her job, and she loved the praise she got for it.

However, when Decebal offered to take Zenjin in and raise him, Beileag had to give up on that life. Yes, she got to spend all her time with him, and she knew that made her happy, but she truly blossomed when she was both with Decebal and living her dream. Taking care of a child-particularly an unhealthily and inhumanly narcissistic and violent one-was not something Beileag wanted to do in life just yet. It certainly didn't help that Zenjin does whatever the heck he wants with Beileag but Decebal just let him do it. He never set down any rules with him when it came to her.

Beileag noticed that Decebal always doted on Zenjin-serving him breakfast, being his punching bag when he was throwing a tantrum, being there when he needed him-and never on her, even throughout all the times they've interacted before Zenjin came into their lives.

The Queen was always nice to her.

"_Why, Billie? Why are you helping them? You have no reason to do any of this. You're not like Decebal. But why? I want to know! You have a bright future ahead of you! Don't throw it away!"_

"_You can do better than this, Beileag! Look how he treats you! Do you really want to spend the rest of your life being his punching bag?!"_

A touch of regret creeped into her heart. The Queen was the most concerned about her during their standoff the other day. She actually looked genuinely worried about her welfare, and didn't want to fight her. Beileag covered her face with her hands, remembering the times when the Queen would shower her with praise whenever she made dresses, the warm smiles she would give, the gestures filled to the brim with undiluted gratitude, her gentle aura, her warm, accepting persona.

Beileag wished she hadn't given that up.

* * *

"Hey, Minamigawa! Would you mind helping me with this problem here?" A boy in homeroom asked Hotaru one day, showing her the algebra equation that has him stumped.

"Sure," Hotaru said as she helped him through the problem.

"Wow, thanks!" The boy exclaimed happily before returning to his seat.

"Minamigawa-san? Sorry, but would you mind lending me your notes for science class? I left mine at home!" One girl begged with her friend in tow.

Hotaru squinted at her a little bit. "I'm sorry, but I can't do that. You can always write new notes down on a piece of paper and hold onto it until you get home," Hotaru told her kindly.

"Good point. Thanks anyway," The girl said before returning to her seat.

"Minamigawa-san, can I borrow your pencil real quick?" Another girl asked.

"Sure. Here," Hotaru said before handing her a pencil. The girl wrote down what she needed to and handed it back to Hotaru without saying thank you. As happy as Hotaru was about being able to help her, she did wish the girl said thank you.

"Jeez, you're getting popular," Hikage said with a smile.

Hotaru donned a slightly worried look. "I don't think popular is the right word for it," Hotaru replied sheepishly, reading her copy of her Akechi Kogoro story collection.

"But aren't you happy people approach you and want to talk to you now?" Hikage asked, a little confused by her odd response.

"That's just it. I don't think they're talking to me because they want to be friends with me."

This had been happening a lot lately. Ever since she befriended Sasami, Hotaru's popularity had spiked, and more people were approaching her and talking to her. This made Hotaru happy at first, since nobody used to want to even go anywhere near her before, and for a stupid reason at that. Plus, Sasami had proven to be a very good friend who was very easy to talk to thanks to her cheerfulness and enthusiasm.

However, Hotaru began to notice something odd. The only times people wanted to talk to her was when they wanted something done or when they needed help on homework. Sometimes the homework they wanted help on was so easy they could easily finish it themselves. No invitations to go out somewhere, no gossiping about the latest weird thing, no stopping by just to have a lovely chat...even Hotaru knew very well that friends don't just use people for things they can't fix themselves. Hikage and Sasami only asked her for help sometimes, but mostly did the work themselves or found others to help them with it when they didn't understand something. At least they talk to her about everything else, have lunch together, and go places for some good, clean fun.

"Hey, Hotaru-chan! Wanna go to Soleil Cafe this weekend?" Sasami asked cheerfully, with a warm, welcoming smile.

Hotaru's eyes twinkled with delight. "Sure! I'd love to! What time?"

Sasami twisted her finger around a ringlet in her hair. "Would one thirty be good? They have really good omurice and chocolate souffles."

"That'd be perfect! But I'll have to ask my parents, though. Would it be okay if I called you once I got an answer?"

"Sure. I totally understand. Oh! You don't have my number, do you? Here!" Sasami pulled out a slip of paper and scribbled a phone number on it with a pen. "Here you go!"

Hotaru took the paper gratefully. "Thank you."

Sasami turned to Hikage. "Hey, Tasogare-kun. Do you want to come too?"

"I'd love to, but I can't. I have basketball practice. You girls deserve some girl time together," Hikage told them with a rueful chuckle.

"Hey, Minamigawa! Help me out with this, will you?" A random boy approached her out of nowhere and showed her an algebra assignment. She glanced at it, miffed at the remarkably easy problem. He's asking her for help on this? She felt a little bubble of anger pop up inside of her, but not wanting to come off as unpleasant, she gently assisted him on the problem without solving it for him completely. "Ohhh! I get it now! Thanks!" He ran off right as the bell rang.

Although she was miffed, Hotaru hoped to calm herself down with more of the wonderful exploits of Akechi Kogoro. But the spring of anger didn't quite get paved.

* * *

After school ended for both the middle and high school, a Corrupt Sentinel suddenly appeared out of nowhere, prompting them to get the heck over there. The CS in question was a black octopus that's about the size of a mansion, throwing trees and buildings all over the place like it was throwing toys around. Despite the Pretty Cure's best efforts, there were many casualties.

Cure Twilight used her Twilight Sparkle attack on the giant black octopus, but it used one of its tentacles to swat it into someone's house, breaking a window. Cure Dawn unleashed a Golden Dawn Explosion on it, but even that wasn't enough to knock it out, as it was still well enough to swat her into someone's house like she was an annoying fly.

"Looks like we're having takoyaki for lunch today!" Cure Dusk shouted valiantly as she landed a flurry of punches and kicks on the octopus's head, but it headbutted her. Thankfully, Cure Dusk recovered quickly and decided to deliver one of her favorite moves. "Time to cook some octopus! Mandarin Dusk Inferno!" A huge tornado of flames finally consumed the octopus. Nobody could tell if it was in any pain or not, as octopus typically don't make any noise. But all of a sudden, the tornado of flames was diminished, and the octopus used its tentacles to jump from one part of the neighborhood to another, flattening many houses in the process.

"Oh no!" The fairies yelled. Lovebeam covered her face with her long ears, unable to watch.

"You have to hurry, girls! You have thirty minutes left!" Moonbeam shouted.

"We're trying!" Cure Dawn exclaimed as she smacked the octopus with her nunchucks, but it swatted her away again.

The black octopus flailed its large tentacles all over the place. Two of them smashed two whole houses to smithereens, reducing them to huge piles of bricks and rubble. Cure Starlight tried landing some roundabout kicks on the octopus, but its flailing tentacles seemed to form a kind of barrier, making it near impossible for her to land a hit without getting swatted like a fly. She did try to punch it, but one of its tentacles smacked her and sent her flying. With the help of the wings on her boots, she managed to regain her composure.

To her horror, she saw a small boy in front of a destroyed house, with his leg caught underneath some rubble. There were brown dirt spots on his face, arms, and clothes, and his chubby face was red from too much crying. One of the tentacles was headed his way.

She couldn't let that little boy die. She just couldn't. What kind of hero would she be if she just left him there?

With her eyes glimmering with determination, she descended down to the destroyed house, swished her arms out, and made a sparkling blue dome appear, encasing both herself and the little boy. A tentacle smacked it a few times, but it wasn't enough to make the shield disappear.

"Come and get me! Dawn Burst!" The octopus began chasing after the yellow Cure once it felt the brunt of her attack, giving Starlight the opportunity to remove the rubble from the boy's leg. The chubby boy finally stopped crying.

"Are you alright?" Starlight asked in a kind, soft whisper as she wiped some dirt off the boy's face and clothes.

The boy nodded tearfully, but he had a smile on his face. For Cure Starlight, this was all the gratitude she needed. She was just glad he was safe. But he couldn't stay here. It was too dangerous. "Does your leg hurt?"

The boy shook his head.

"Go somewhere safe. Quickly," The boy did as asked and ran away from the chaotic scene as fast as he could. Cure Starlight's head was beginning to pound, but she tried to ignore it. This was no time to be irritated or to worry about herself.

"Hey! Starlight! We could use a little help here!" Cure Dusk bellowed as she punched the octopus on its head, flying upward to avoid getting hit by two of its tentacles.

"Twilight Sparkle!" With her ring glowing in a radiant purple light, Cure Twilight threw it at the octopus like it was a boomerang. Unfortunately for her, the behemoth swatted it away like it was a fly. Worse, it used the very same tentacle to catch her and coil around her. She could feel her body being squeezed both inside and out. She tried to free herself, whether it was flailing her limbs around or unsheathing her claws. But the octopus's tentacle was so large and so tightly wrapped around her that she couldn't move. "Help..." That was all she could choke out at that moment.

"Hang on, Twi! Dusk Medley!" Cure Dusk wasted no time firing a barrage of flaming music notes at the black behemoth. She couldn't lose the first person her own age who treated her like a human being in years. None of the flames made so much as a mark on the octopus's skin, much to Dusk's horror. "Come on! Do something, powers! We need to purify this thing!"

The attack did get its attention, as the octopus turned around to face Cure Dusk. Before she could fly away, it swatted her with one of its tentacles, sending her flying through a glass window, rolling right into someone's house. A mother and her child stormed out of the room in a panic as soon as Cure Dusk got back on her feet and charged back outside, her eyes flaming with anger. "I'm not done with you yet!"

"Take this!" Cure Dawn slammed the octopus's head with her golden nunchucks at least ten times, hoping to knock it unconscious so it would free Cure Twilight involuntarily, to no avail. As usual, none of them made so much as a dent, and it used one of its free tentacles to swat Cure Dawn at a tree, knocking her unconscious.

"Help!" Cure Twilight cried. She was losing energy. She struggled to free herself, but nothing she did worked. She couldn't die here. There was too much she wanted to do.

Cure Starlight leaped onto the scene. "Starlight Shower!" A rain of glowing blue stars descended onto the octopus with the force of a thousand meteors. They came down so hard and so quickly that it released Cure Twilight from its grasp. She could breathe and move around again.

"Yay! I'm free!" Cure Twilight stretched her arms and legs out, happy to finally be out from that octopus's tentacle. "Thanks St-" But before she could thank her fellow friend and savior, she gasped with horror as the octopus crawled toward a tree, zooming in on Cure Dawn, who was struggling to get back on her feet. "Oh no you don't! Twilight Serenade!" A purple beam of light shot out from the purple cat girl's hands, firing at the oblivious octopus.

It did no damage, but like with Cure Dusk's attack, it did get the octopus's attention. As happy as Cure Twilight was to save Cure Dawn from its wrath, the octopus decided to zoom in on her instead, and tried swatting her with its tentacles over and over.

"Meooowww!" Cure Twilight barely managed to evade all the attacks, even as she ran from every one of them like a cheetah trying to catch its prey.

Cure Starlight helped Cure Dawn on her feet. "Are you okay?"

"A little beat up, but...I'm good," Cure Dawn choked, flashing a thumb's up.

"I'll tend to your injuries," Starbeam flitted over to the blonde girl and pulled a first aid kit out of her ribbon. The pounding in Cure Starlight's head continued.

"How much longer?" Lovebeam asked worriedly, clutching her ears tightly.

"They have about fifteen minutes," Sunbeam replied.

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Cure Dusk fired three flaming arrows at the octopus to distract it long enough for Cure Twilight to get it off her tail. However, the octopus retaliated by attempting to swat her once again. Cure Dusk grabbed it with one of her tentacles, but it was so heavy she slipped off, and it slammed into some trees, knocking them right over. One of them fell right on top of someone's house, causing the roof tiles to slide right off and shatter upon hitting the concrete.

"Uuuugh!" Cure Starlight groaned as she finally slashed the octopus's face with her naginata, but a lot more fiercely this time around. Many times, to be exact. She never let up, not even as the octopus tried miserably to swat her away to no avail.

The girls couldn't help but be a little frightened. They saw her fight, and they knew from experience that she's quite vicious in battle, but she never looked this angry before. Her blue eyes are literally blazing with anger, like they were about to pop right out of her face, and her teeth grinded so much they could almost disappear if ground enough.

"Come on, girls! Let's finish it off!" Cure Dawn exclaimed loud enough for the girls to hear.

"Lend us your strength, holy light! Pretty Cure Dazzling Gleam!" With their dazzling radiance, the octopus dissolved into a glass orb. The fairies took it and put it back into a young woman's Soul Portal.

Unfortunately for the girls, this battle was a lot more fierce than they thought. Trees were gnarled and ripped from their original places, strewn around like a pile of twigs. Some houses were now huge piles of debris. Some electrical lines got cut, and some sparks of electricity flickered out of them.

Cure Twilight cringed and covered her ears when she saw two little kids wailing and crying, shaking their limp, lifeless, unconscious mother, telling her to wake up. The woman was trapped under a huge pile of debris, dormant and unmoving despite the best efforts of the children. Another woman was tearfully performing CPR on a man, possibly her boyfriend, to no avail. The roar of sirens came closer and closer, prompting the Pretty Cure and the fairies to flee to a safer spot.

Cure Dusk groaned before punching a nearby tree. "I can't believe this! That octopus was just too strong!" Cure Dusk grunted before punching the air with her fist, suddenly releasing some flames. Cure Dawn backed up to avoid getting burned.

"I know. That was our toughest opponent yet," Starbeam said sadly. "It seems the Corrupt Sentinels we're fighting now are many times stronger than the ones we've faced in the past."

Cure Twilight fell to her knees. "People died just now! How can we be so stupid?!" Cure Twilight cried with tears streaming down her face as Moonbeam tried to comfort her by sitting on her shoulder. It didn't work.

"It's inevitable, really. We try to be careful, but you never know what these things can do," Cure Dawn added.

What the girls and fairies didn't know was that Cure Starlight was in a world of her own. The spring of anger she thought would just fade away suddenly erupted into a full on geyser, exploding in the depths of her heart, dying to come right out. Starlight was helpless to stop it. Her teeth grinded together and she turned around on her heel rather vehemently. "...it's because you keep being reckless that things turn out like this!"

The girls turned around, shocked by Cure Starlight's sudden yelling just now. Cure Twilight covered her ears and hid behind Cure Dawn. "Starlight!? What are you-"

"You can't even do anything by yourselves and always have me be the one to do everything for you! You should know better than to be so inconsiderate and selfish!" Cure Starlight suddenly shouted out of nowhere, her face red with anger.

"Selfish?! Inconsiderate?! That's not true and you know it! What's gotten into you?!" Cure Dusk asked, flabbergasted by the change in the normally serene, calm, and level headed Cure Starlight's behavior. Just like everyone else, Cure Twilight even more so, since her eyes were wide, her ears were covered with her hands, shaking like she was reliving a traumatic experience. Cure Dawn ran in between the furious Cure Starlight and the confused Cure Dusk.

"Enough! Stop yelling! We're all at the end of our tether here, and yelling isn't going to solve anything!" Cure Dawn exclaimed, trying not to raise her voice for Riko's sake, but neither Cure paid her any heed.

"Why can't you ever clean up your own messes for once instead of making me do it for you?! I can't do everything, y'know! Get your act together or we're done!" Cure Starlight shouted angrily before flying off. Cure Dusk, in her own fit of anger, shot a fireball into the sky. It dissolved into the air, so it didn't set anything on fire, thank goodness.

"What's her problem?" Cure Dawn asked as Cure Starlight flew into the distance. The further the blue haired girl flew into the sky, the more she looked like an angel, only her behavior isn't exactly angelic right now.

"Did...we do something wrong?" Sunbeam asked Starbeam, confused.

"I'm afraid I don't know. I've never seen her behave that way before," Starbeam replied doubtfully. All of a sudden, Cure Twilight fell to her knees, her face buried in her hands, sniveling and sobbing. Cure Dawn kneeled to her level and rubbed her back.

"Don't cry, Twi," Cure Dawn told her gently, but it didn't work.

This was a pretty tough battle, tougher than all of their other ones. It was only natural they'd be stressed out and frustrated. Why wouldn't they be? But Hotaru really didn't have to lash out at them like that.

* * *

Hotaru didn't feel better, not even as she turned back to normal and stomped all the way back to her house, clutching her naginata bag. _'Even my own friends...they use me for their own convenience, too! I'm sick of being used like this!'_ She stomped all throughout her walk back home, not taking a moment to stop and just breathe. She stormed through the door, stomped to her room, and threw herself on her bed, slamming her pillows with her fists, unknowingly causing one of her Sherlock Holmes books to fall onto the floor face down. Before she could sit there in silence, there was a knock on the door.

"Hotaru-chan? You alright, dear?" Kyouichi's voice asked from behind the door. Hotaru took a pillow and threw it at the door.

"No! I'm not alright! Don't ask me to clean up whatever mess you just made! Just leave me alone!" Hotaru yelled before pushing her face into her pillow, wishing it'd just swallow her up. After that, it was silent, which allowed Hotaru to be lost in her thoughts. Starbeam came into the room through an open window, but seeing Hotaru lying on her bed made her sit in a corner and read one of Hotaru's _Detective Conan_(1) books, figuring she needed her space.

'_She'll talk to me or someone when she's ready. I shouldn't pester her about her behavior, or she'll think I'm being a bothersome nuisance,'_ Starbeam thought as she read through a chapter of Shinichi Kudo's daring exploits.

The tired, exhausted girl finally felt some relief lying in her bed, feeling the puddles of anger left behind by the geyser evaporate in the sunlight. But the awful memory of taking her anger out on her friends dawned on her, and she didn't like what she remembered. She actually yelled at her dear friends! She sat up and put a hand on her face like she was checking to see if she had a fever.

She couldn't believe that memory was even there. She actually did that? Yell at her friends, who had always been there for her, supported her, hung out with her, and helped her out when she needed it? All because she thought they were using her when they really weren't. What did they do to deserve that? Nothing, that's what. Plus, she just remembered that she yelled at Kyouichi just a few minutes ago when all he was doing was checking on her, like a good parent would. Her heart drowning in a sea of regret, Hotaru buried her face in her hands.

"How could I be so stupid?" Hotaru mused to herself sadly, realizing the extent of what she had done. "Why am I being such a brat? They don't deserve to be treated like that!" Hotaru wished she could turn back time and fix everything so she wouldn't have acted so rashly. _'I probably just need to calm down a little. If I'm still frazzled, I'll just end up making things worse,'_ She thought before leaving the room. She grabbed a milk carton from the refrigerator, poured it into a glass cup, and drank some cold, snow white milk. Boy, did that feel refreshing.

"Feeling better?" Hotaru turned around to find Kyouichi grabbing a bag of potato chips from the cupboard. Hotaru looked away, her ocean blue eyes filled to the brim with rue. She wished she hadn't yelled at him earlier.

"No. Sorry I yelled at you back there," Hotaru apologized as she sat down on the dining room table. With a smile Kyouichi sat down next to her.

"I can tell when something's bothering you. Want to talk about it? It's not good to keep it all bottled up," Kyouichi told her kindly, unfazed by her out of character behavior some minutes ago.

Hotaru put her hands on her legs and folded them, looking down at them. "Have you ever met people who kept on asking you to help them with things...only to find out they're all just using you to fix everything for them and not do it themselves?" Hotaru asked sheepishly.

"Sometimes, yeah," Kyouichi said. "Anyone picking on you again?"

Hotaru shook her head. "No. I've actually gotten a bit popular...but not for the right reasons. People at school only seem to talk to me just so they can have me help them with all their homework, even stuff that's so easy a person who's failing high school in general can do. They never just want to talk or hang out or anything like that. Hikage-kun and Sasami-chan aren't like that, thank goodness, but...I just wish people would see me as more than just a walking computer or a problem solver. Worse than that, I was cruel to my friends earlier today, thinking they wanted me to clean up their mess."

"You get into a fight with Hikage-kun?"

Hotaru felt bad about lying to him, but she knew she had to. "Something like that."

"True friends are always there for you and help you out whenever possible, and sometimes you help them to balance it out. If these people just use you to help them and don't help you, then they're not your friends, and you should tell them straight up that you're not some tool they can use for their own convenience. I had to deal with some chuckleheads at work who were just like that. But I've been blessed with many good friends in my life, who have always helped me when I needed them, Sojiro being one of them. It's good to help people, but if they don't appreciate the help you give them, then they're not truly friends. Sometimes even family who act like that need to have some sense knocked into them. But there are always people who appreciate you for who you are, and I like helping people out because I want to, and just because there are people who'll take advantage of that, it's no reason to give up on being kind altogether, especially your friends. My dad says it's always better to be the helper than the hindrance. Know what I mean?" Kyouichi explained as best he could, but he rubbed his head of hair with his hand a little bit, wondering if anything he said came out wrong.

Hotaru thought about Riko, Marina, and Anzu, and the struggles they've had to face since they've become Pretty Cure. It was true they made some mistakes, some that even they can't clean up because of how dire the circumstances were. But they never made Hotaru do all the fighting, and often always came to her rescue when needed, even though Hotaru was technically the oldest and strongest Pretty Cure in their quartet.

Plus, Riko, Anzu, and Marina are younger than her, and they all have a huge burden on their shoulders that they need to carry. No child should be subjected to the task of having to save the world, especially when there's the possibility that things could go horribly wrong, like today. She had to wonder how the kids were managing to keep it together (then again, Riko, being autistic, had been taking a lot of things really hard, probably even cracking under everything, the yelling only being the icing on the cake) and not completely breaking down. For them, it was more understandable that they may need help because they're kids, and if something bad happens, how could they take responsibility for it? Not only that, the kids had always invited her to come over and hang out, like real friends do, even though Hotaru herself can't always make it due to school and naginata practice.

"How could I have been so cruel? They've helped me so much, and yet I repay them by yelling at them…" Hotaru buried her face in her hands. Kyouichi wrapped his arm around his teenage daughter and pulled her close.

"Everyone has bad days. I'm sure they'll understand. Your friends must be really good people, and I know you've always wanted friends," Kyouichi told her calmly and reassuringly. "Don't let people use you or take advantage of you. If they can't accept the fact that you're a person or appreciate the nice things you do for them, then they're not worth your time. I know you're a strong, kind girl, and don't let anyone step all over you."

Hotaru smiled, feeling her second father's love. She wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him a peck on the cheek. "Thanks, Kyouichi," With that, she stood up, grabbed her naginata bag, and walked out of the house. "I'll be back before dinner!"

* * *

In the fortress, Beileag yet again looked at herself in her mirror, wearing a beautiful, sparkly little pearl pink one piece dress, with cotton candy pink pearl earrings and pink shoes to match. She twirled around like a little ballerina, making the dress come alive, with the skirt spinning upward and flowing in the spin. Beileag felt like a little girl again.

"Now THIS is perfect! It really sets off my hair and eyes, and it fits my figure just perfectly!" Beileag exclaimed happily, really fitting into her new dress like it was tailor made for her. She truly felt flattering.

She found herself remembering the days when she would rummage through her box of dresses and try everything on, looking at herself in ponds, water puddles, and mirrors that were lying around whenever she and her family would move. She never stayed long enough to have people pay attention to her because her family would always up and move, taking her with them to wherever it is they wanted to go next. They never stayed in one place, as she remembered.

(flashback)

_Beileag, about fifteen years old, wearing her indigo hair in a flouncy ponytail, approached her parents one day, both dressed like hippies. Her father has very long, indigo hair that stretched all the way down to his stomach and lower back, with a matching mustache and beard, and ocean blue eyes, wearing a long sleeved grey shirt with a sleeveless tye dye vest, blue jeans, and brown boots, along with green, rectangle shaped glasses and a red headband. Her mother is wearing a long black skirt, a white blouse, a tye dye headband, and beige sandals, with light green hair and lavender eyes, with her hair tied in a really long braid that went down to her ankles._

"_Mom? Dad? There's something I want to tell you," Beileag began._

"_What's up, Billie dear?" Her father asked cheerfully._

_Beileag balled her fists. There was no going back now. "The Rozanielan Fairy Troupe...they scouted me," She blurted out, rendering her parents silent. They didn't look appalled or angry, nor did they seem happy either. Just confused. Beileag continued. "I know you guys want me to travel the world with you, and believe me, I love you both. But...you know I've always wanted to be an actress, and this is my only chance to be one. If I turn them down, I know I'll regret it for the rest of my life! And I don't want to lose my only chance of fulfilling my dream!"_

_Her parents looked at each other with confused faces at first before turning back to Beileag. "Mom. Dad. I know you guys want me to wander the planet with you, but...this isn't my life. I don't like going to so many places at once. I want to stay in one place and live a stable life. I want to settle down, find my soulmate, and do whatever I want. You're free to get mad at me, but I've made my decision."_

"_We're not mad, sweetie," Beileag's mother told her sweetly, much to Beileag's surprise. "We know we've been stringing you along all these years, not thinking about how you felt about everything. We're sorry. We shouldn't be the ones to decide your destiny, even to the point of giving you a name that seemed to decide it. You deserve to fulfill your dream and be happy."_

"_But Zenobia…" Beileag's father muttered worriedly before turning to Beileag. "Billie, dear, don't get us wrong. We're happy you're growing up and making your own decisions. But...are you sure you want to do this? There are people out there who will take advantage of you and hurt you. That's why we wander the planet, so we can live our lives freely and enjoy everything without the chance of that happening."_

"_I've already been hurt and taken advantage of, Dad. Remember the kids who picked on me and blamed me for the school hamster's death?" Beileag said._

"_Armin. Let the girl speak her mind," Zenobia told her husband, Armin._

"_Billie...I just don't want you getting hurt. Besides, do you really want to spend your whole life being chained down and forced to do things you don't want to?" Armin asked worriedly._

"_You know I'm sick of going to all these places and not being able to leave my mark. I want to settle down and actually enjoy things," Beileag said. _

_Armin looked down at his feet with a pained look, like Beileag's words were an arrow that shot him in the heart. The sight of Armin's sad face made Beileag's heart sink. She knew they loved her dearly and didn't want her to get hurt. In her heart, she didn't want to leave them either. But she knew that if she turned down this chance to fulfill her dream, she may never get another opportunity like this ever again, and she already made her decision._

_About a few days later, Beileag packed a bag and was about to set off, away from the horse carriage that was her home, until she saw Zenobia approach her. "You're leaving now, Billie?"_

"_Yes I am, Mom," Beileag said, clinging to her bag. "I want to do this."_

_Tearful, Zenobia embraced her daughter and buried her face on her daughter's shoulder. "No matter how far apart we are, I want you to know that you'll always be our dear little Billie, and you'll always have a home with us. We'll write to you when we can. Just...take good care of yourself, okay?" Zenobia blubbered. "Don't let anyone hurt you or take advantage of you."_

_Beileag's heart sank once more. She stroke her crying mother's back gently with her free hand. "I will. I love you, Mom. Tell Dad I love him too," With these final words, Beileag left for the Rozanielan Fairy Troupe, her heart full of resolve, as her wish to become an actress is finally coming true. She was sure she wouldn't regret this decision. She was sure she could be happy._

_And for a while, she was...until everything ended when Decebal took Zenjin in._

(end flashback)

"I should write to them. They must think I died in the destruction or something," Beileag mused to herself as she left her room to find some envelopes and paper. She always kept a pen in her room, so she could get everything she needed and just go back in there. The entire fortress is silent without Decebal and Zenjin, and the latter is always either screaming his lungs out over nothing or causing some kind of ruckus, usually blowing things up for kicks and giggles. As empty as she feels without anyone paying attention to her, she's at least happy it's quiet and peaceful. No yelling, no screaming, nothing getting blown up, nothing like that.

But where were the envelopes and paper? She looked all over the fortress and found nothing even resembling paper or envelopes. She remembered she had powers, but she can't create things like envelopes or paper. Only their ancestors could do that before they made the Energia. But this didn't stop her from looking everywhere. She came up empty, and just as she was about to go back to her room to plan to go to Earth for shopping, she felt something prickly underneath her pink shoe. She looked down and picked up a gold hair brush.

"This is Decebal's, I know it," Beileag muttered to herself before sighing. She figured she'd put it in his room so nobody would stub their toes on it. She knew that if Zenjin did, he'd throw a universe destroying tantrum of epic proportions, and getting blown into oblivion was the last thing she wanted. Besides, at least Decebal would appreciate the kind sentiment.

She entered his room, as usual awed by how gaudily old fashioned it was. White wallpapers with red roses all over it, a beautiful, sparkling chandelier dangling from the ceiling, a mahogany bookshelf full of books, namely Shakespeare and Henrik Ibsen books, a gold and green bed built into the wall with a gold canopy, a gold desk, a large mirror in front of it, a closet full of Shakespearian style clothes, dark gold flooring, and everything else one could find in the era of Marie Antoinette.

Beileag's lavender eyes sparkled like she came into the chambers of heaven, only it was just Decebal's empty room. To her, it looked more lavish and grandiose than Queen Malgorzata's room, and that was saying something! But she couldn't help but think he overdid it a little, even though she definitely liked how the room was set up.

She put the hair brush on his desk and noticed a little book next to it. Upon closer inspection, it wasn't one of Decebal's books. The book was somewhat thick, with pale brown leather tied together with a yellow string. Beileag had only one thought in her head: this might be Decebal's diary! Filled to the brim with his thoughts, feelings, grievances, records of days past, everything! Innocently curious, Beileag reached her hand out to touch it. But before she could grab it, she stopped, pulled it back, and crossed her arms.

"You really shouldn't be snooping, Billie!" Beileag scolded herself lightly as she turned on her heel and looked away from Decebal's diary. Peeking in someone's diary is an invasion of privacy. Even she knew that much. But...the more she thought about it, the more she yearned to know how Decebal felt about her. He must have written about her somewhere, deep in the pages of his journal, and Beileag wants more than anything to know how he feels about it. She found herself giggling.

"Oh, but it's so much fun, Billie!" Beileag took the journal and undid the golden knot. _'Sorry, Decebal! I won't do anything bad to it! I promise!'_ Beileag thought as she opened the journal, coming across the first page of his journal.

**Our new play, Moonlight Manor, opened tonight. We had a great turnout.**

She skimmed through more pages. **King Ghislain and I rescued a child from an evil woman. The boy was so battered and so broken I'm surprised he was breathing when we found him. I hope he survives.**

More pages. Then she came across this: **Anthony is such a fool. The minute I asked him about the Energia, he went on and on! Not only that, he told me everything about how the security systems could be broken! This'll be perfect!**

'_Decebal's been after the Energia from the beginning?!'_ Beileag thought, shocked. Most of his entries consisted of him either demeaning King Ghislain for whatever reason, or wishing for the Energia to be in his grasp. Then came this entry: **The boy calls himself Zenjin. He's recovering quite nicely. But he's tearing the house apart! He keeps screaming his lungs out, throwing everything into the wall and ripping Beileag's dresses! His screaming makes my ears bleed! But...I love his spirit. His outbursts mean that he's finally realizing his potential, accepting his desire for power and strength, to take revenge on the world that has cruelly used him for it's convenience. I can make great use of his lust for power. If I can instill in him a desire for revenge, he can steal the Energia for me, and I can use it to ransack this pathetic saccharine excuse of a planet! It's such a good thing I took him under my wing. He will be of great use to me. I wish he'd stop screaming like a loon, though!**

Beileag's eyes grew wider and wider. Decebal took Zenjin in to manipulate him and use him as a way for him to get the Energia? Not only that, this was dated five years ago, the time when Zenjin had the bad phase where he destroyed everything in his path. No wonder he never asked for outside help! He never intended to! He actually condoned it, and possibly other bad behaviors!

"Decebal...I never knew all of this…" Beileag muttered as she skimmed through more pages. But she stopped at one page, and never went past it. Her lavender eyes, obscured by her red, star shaped glasses, grew wider and wider until they looked like they were about to explode. The diary slipped out of her hands and bounced on the floor before stopping face down. The corners of one page got bent as a result. But Beileag didn't care.

She didn't think her heart could be broken. But not only was it broken, it was broken by a wrecking ball, smashed and ground into dust, and the dust is being carried away by the wind, disappearing into oblivion. Beileag fell to her knees, her glasses falling off and bouncing on the floor. Her shoulders began trembling, and her fists began to have little bolts of purple lightning spark around it.

After a few minutes of just sitting there, dumbfounded and hurt beyond repair, she stood up, screamed her lungs out, and unleashed an explosion of energy all over the place, leaving huge cracks and holes in the walls, tearing the bed sheets and canopy into shreds, burning all of his books, sparing his diary, reducing all of his clothes into a black, charred mess. The explosion of power ended, but it didn't satiate Beileag's explosion of anger.

With a high pitched growl, she pulled out Decebal's drawers and sent all of his clothes flying while ripping a bunch of them with her own bare hands. She didn't care if he got mad at her for it. Let him be mad! She stomped on whatever books she didn't destroy, hoping they'd be smushed right into the ground. She fired some balls of energy at the wall, leaving huge rips and holes in the rosy wallpaper. With that, she flailed her arms around with a scream and stomped out of the room.

Some tears plopped onto the floor.

* * *

Hotaru ran through the streets with Starbeam following her from behind. No, there aren't any Corrupt Sentinels attacking the city right now. "I don't think you need to be in such a rush, Hotaru," Starbeam told her.

"I know, but I want to apologize to them all face to face and get it over with," Hotaru replied as she ran like the wind. The only problem was, before she could run any further, a purple lightning bolt suddenly shot at her, startling her to the point of causing her to fall on her rear end.

Thankfully, she and Starbeam weren't hurt, but Hotaru immediately pulled out her Heart Lighter, knowing what might happen. All of a sudden, purple lightning bolts were striking down all over the place, barely missing some people. Some actually managed to electrocute people to the point of making them fall unconscious.

"Die! Die! All of you! DIE!" Beileag's high pitched voice rang throughout the town as she threw down purple lightning bolts on just about anything that moved. Hotaru and Starbeam ran to the scene quickly, horrified at the impending casualties.

"Stop that right now!" Hotaru yelled. Beileag turned around with an unusually angry look on her normally perky and cheerful little face, so much so that even Hotaru couldn't help but be a little frightened. They may not have run into Beileag often, but they never saw her get angry before.

But before Hotaru could transform, Beileag snapped her fingers, shooting down a lightning bolt that knocked Hotaru's Heart Lighter out of her hand, leaving a red mark on her hand. "Ow!" Not only that, a wall appeared behind Hotaru, and golden ropes pulled her onto it, revealing her Soul Portal.

"Hotaru! I'll save you!" Starbeam tried to pry the ropes off of her, but Beileag yanked her off of the rope and threw her to the sidewalk like she was a broken doll. Beileag wasted no time dunking her head in Hotaru's Soul Portal, causing the girl to scream and howl in pain, like knives were cutting slowly and painfully through every single vein in her body.

'_Is this what it's like...to have your very soul invaded?'_ Hotaru thought before Beileag pulled out her Soul Orb successfully.

"Oh no!" Starbeam cried frightfully.

"I don't care anymore! Go crazy, Human Trash!" Beileag screamed vehemently as the black orb morphed into a gigantic firefly, but without the glowing butt. Not only that, it's wings didn't quite work, so all it could do was hop from building to building. The rest of the girls arrived on the scene, shocked by what they found.

"NO! HOTARU-CHAN!" Riko screamed as she ran toward her friend. But one of the firefly's legs almost stepped on her, and she barely managed to evade it. With that, she transformed into Cure Twilight. Anzu and Marina followed suit. Cure Twilight delivered the first attack by slashing the firefly's face with her claws. Cures Dawn and Dusk both landed flurries of kicks and punches on the firefly's wings and thorax, but it knocked them all away.

Suddenly, Cure Twilight found herself flying toward Beileag, her teeth grinding and her eyes blazing with anger, like an angry cat about to pounce on its prey. Beileag held onto her wrists and managed to hold her off, but this ferocious cat wasn't going to give up. "How could you do that to Hotaru-chan?! She never did anything bad to you!" Cure Twilight yelled angrily.

"I need something to take my anger out on!" Beileag yelled before pushing Cure Twilight away.

"_My friends only value me for my intelligence! People only see me as someone they can use to fix everything for them!"_ The firefly bellowed sadly as Cure Dusk fired a flaming arrow at it.

"You better change her back to normal right now!" Cure Twilight demanded angrily.

"Why? All you do is use her to clean up your messes like a bunch of babies! Like everybody else does with me!" Beileag snapped.

"No we don't!" Cure Twilight yelled, attempting to punch Beileag, but she drops a purple lightning bolt on her, sending burning pain all throughout the little girl's body. Twilight screamed as her body pulsated with electricity, continuing to do so even after it faded.

"Twilight!" Cure Dawn tried to go after her, but the firefly headbutted her, knocking her away.

Much to Beileag's surprise, Cure Twilight managed to get on all fours, even though she has many scratches on her body, with gravel digging into her knees. "You can...torture me all you want...but don't hurt Hotaru-chan!" She hissed at first, her voice choking a little from the electrocution. "She's smart...kind...nice…and she's always there for us! Now it's our turn to be there for her! We're her friends! Friends don't abandon each other! She deserves our help more than anything! She's worked hard to get where she is now! I'M NOT GONNA LET YOU TAKE ADVANTAGE OF HER FEELINGS!" Cure Twilight screamed at the top of her lungs. A tear strolled out from one of Hotaru's eyes, falling on the concrete in which her limp, unconscious body was lying.

All of a sudden, Cure Twilight stood up just like before, like she had never been hurt, and both of her hands were glowing in a radiant purple light. She turned around to make a circle around herself. "Twilight Masquerade!" With a swing of both her arms, the circle of light suddenly erupted into a shower of purple, bubble shaped lights barraging the giant firefly, rendering it unable to move. But it wasn't enough to turn it back into Hotaru's Soul Orb.

"Just leave her alone! She's not even worth it, so why bother?!" Beileag yelled.

"You expect US to abandon our friend in her time of need?! Get over yourself!" Cure Dusk bellowed, repressing a deep seated desire to set that hippie on fire for her callousness. Both her hands are encased in flames like she wants to unleash a Flame Fist Fury attack.

"And she is SO worth it! She's our friend, that's why! We do make mistakes, and often we can't fix them because we're just kids! But people make mistakes and we try to fix them regardless, and if we can't do it alone, your friends are willing to help! Friends don't make people fix their messes! They help out on their own accord!" Cure Dawn exclaimed. The girls and fairies all turned to the giant firefly.

"Fiery Dusk Arrow!"

"Dawn Flame!"

"Twilight Masquerade!"

With their combined powers, the firefly disintegrated, turning back into Hotaru's Soul Orb. Cure Twilight took the glass ball and gently put it in Hotaru's Soul Portal. The life and color returned to her body. Hotaru wasted no time waking up.

"Hotaru-chan! You're okay!" Cure Twilight squealed happily as she glomped her waking friend and squeezed her like she never wanted to let go. Hotaru smiled and stroke Riko's back. Starbeam nuzzled her face against hers, making her smile more.

"Thank you for helping me…" Hotaru said.

"No prob," Cure Dusk said.

"Do you really think we only see you as a smart person? You're our friend! You're more than just smart! You're nice and kind and awesome! Sorry we're not as good at stuff as you are! We don't mean to mess up or make you mad!" Cure Twilight told her apologetically. With a warm smile, Hotaru stroke the cat girl's purple hair gently.

"I know," Hotaru said.

"Grrrrrr! I oughta blow you up right now!" Beileag roared and was about to blow them up with another energy beam until a voice stopped her from doing so.

"There you are, Beileag!" Zenjin called out.

Beileag angrily turned around to find Zenjin and Decebal standing behind her, with flummoxed looks on their faces. "STOP CALLING ME BEILEAG YOU BLOODTHIRSTY IDIOTS!" Beileag screamed at the top of her lungs, causing Riko to cover her ears.

"Jeez. What's got your undies in a bunch?" Zenjin asked.

Hotaru got on her feet and pulled out her naginata. "If you're here to cause more trouble, don't think we're going to let you off easy!" Hotaru bellowed, aiming her naginata right at Zenjin.

"Actually, no we're not. But you know what? I'm sick of you all ruining our fun, so I challenge you trash to a battle! On Rozaniela in three days!" Zenjin yelled, pointing his finger at them.

"A battle?! On Rozaniela?! What's wrong with you?!" Sunbeam yelled.

"What ISN'T wrong with him?" Moonbeam asked.

"Do you accept my challenge or not? You better, or else I'll make this entire planet explode!" Zenjin yelled.

"Now now, Zenjin, don't be hasty," Decebal warned.

"We accept your challenge! It's about time we kicked your sorry butt anyway!" Cure Dusk proclaimed.

"But he's too strong! He could kill us!" Cure Dawn exclaimed.

"She's right! We can't defeat them!" Cure Twilight added with worry being painted on her face.

"We're gonna have to face them sooner or later! Why not now?" Cure Dusk said.

"Good! We'll meet in the Grand Desert in three days! It's time we ended this once and for all, you trash! We'll be waiting!" Zenjin yelled before he, Decebal, and Beileag disappeared, but not before his maniacal laughter echoed in the air.

Cure Dawn facepalmed. "What have we gotten ourselves into?"

"I guess we can't avoid it now, can we?" Lovebeam asked. "I really don't like fighting, and with powers of his caliber, he could kill us! I don't wanna die!" Lovebeam cried.

The girls knew they got roped into a pretty tight situation that they couldn't get out of. But perhaps this might prove to be a good opportunity. They could finally fight Zenjin once and for all, even though the chances of them winning are extremely slim.

* * *

On Rozaniela, in a small room, a blonde haired man in a toga looked through some yellowing scrolls, with many odd but beautiful and lavish pictures on them, with some ancient text accompanying them. One of these pictures is a large tree with eggs of light dangling from it. Another one is a beautiful woman surrounded by light, wearing what appears to be a snow white wedding dress that made her look absolutely radiant. A man picked up a titanium thermos and pried it open.

"Ugh! These things are hard to open! Whoever our ancestors are, they sure took some pretty insane precautions," The man grunted as he popped off the cap. He turned it upside down, hoping more scrolls or unread documents would pop out.

Instead, five brooches appeared. Very elaborate ones at that. Golden star shaped jewels with little silver wings protruding from them, outstretched like a bird ready to fly into the sky. A small paper accompanied them. The man opened the piece of paper to see if he could decipher it. As it turns out, the text was easy to read.

"These brooches are called Light Bringers. If a Pretty Cure's conviction is strong, and the light in their hearts are shining brightly with hope and determination, the Light Bringers amplify it and turn it into purifying energy, so they can manipulate it at will and use it to purify darkness and evil," The man read. There was something more, so he read that excerpt silently. He put the brooches back in the thermos, put the cap back on, went out of the room, and locked the door tightly. "The Queen has to hear about this!" The man said before running out of his quarters.


	27. Pretty Cure VS Zenjin!

_**ATTENTION: TRIGGER WARNING FOR CHILD ABUSE!**_

Chapter 25: An Epic Standoff! Pretty Cure VS Zenjin!

"What?! He challenged you to a duel?!" It was recess, and the girls just told Kyoya about what happened yesterday.

With a worried expression, Riko nodded, squeezing her folded hands. "Yeah. We'd like to back out since he's so powerful, but who knows what he could do!"

Marina cracked her knuckles. "I'm more interested in kicking his sorry butt!"

"Have you told anyone about this? Like Queen Malgorzata?" Kyoya asked.

"We plan to right after school ends," Anzu piped in. "We can't ignore this, so we're gonna have to accept his challenge, even though our chances of winning are pretty much negative infinity at our piddly power level. His is probably over 9000!"

"This isn't the time for Dragon Ball Z jokes!" Marina snapped, her flaming orange hair matching her frazzled gold eyes.

"You gonna bring the fairies with you?" Kyoya asked.

"We thought about leaving them out of this since their home was destroyed, but they insisted on coming with us and joining in on the duel," Riko said. "Personally, I'd feel more secure if they stayed home! I don't want them getting hurt!"

"Me either," Anzu agreed.

"Honestly...if you guys don't mind me saying this...I want to come with you," Kyoya said.

All the girls did double takes before whipping their heads toward him. "What?! Why?!" They couldn't prevent the dropping of their jaws.

"I mean, I know I can't do much, but I don't want to sit here while you guys put your lives on the line," Kyoya said.

Marina swung her arms at him once. "Absolutely not! It's too dangerous, even for us!"

"I agree. He could kill us, and he certainly won't spare you! And we all know he tried to strangle you the first time you guys met! If you died...I can't bear to lose you!" Riko cried. She didn't want to think about the horrible things that could happen to Kyoya if he came to watch their battle, especially considering how powerful and homicidal Zenjin was.

"I get that. But I don't want to lose you guys either! Besides, all I want to do is watch and see how you guys duke it out with him. Plus, if the fairies are hurt, they can stay with me, and he's way more concerned about beating the living daylights out of you than me," Kyoya reasoned.

"Even so, it's still dangerous! Millions of people have died because of him!" Marina yelled.

After that, the issue wasn't brought up again. The final school bell rang, and when the kids got out, they found Lovebeam flying toward them. "Hey!"

"Lovebeam?!" Anzu grabbed Lovebeam and kept her hidden from the other kids. "What are you doing here?!" She hissed quietly so nobody would hear. "Someone'll see you!"

"I know! But Queen Malgorzata wants you all to come to Rozaniela right now!" Lovebeam told them in a whisper. The kids looked at each other. The Queen wanted them. That was enough to tell them that whatever it was, it must be something important.

They met at Anzu's house, and Riko called Hotaru to tell her about it. Soon, Hotaru and the rest of the fairies arrived. Kyoya came with them, and the girls agreed to this, since they were probably just going to discuss something, and they felt he had a right to know. The kids and fairies made it to the palace, meeting with Queen Malgorzata on the first floor.

"We came as fast as we could, Queen!" Riko exclaimed.

"What did you want to talk to us about?" Anzu asked.

"My friend Jervis made a great discovery, and I think you girls deserve to have it," The Queen said before presenting four star shaped brooches. Their golden coats shimmered in the light, and they donned small, silver wings. The girls took them in their hands.

"What are those?" Moonbeam asked curiously. She was awestruck by how beautiful they were, especially in the light, and how intricate the details on the wings were.

"These are called Light Bringers. Jervis discovered them yesterday as he was deciphering the archives. When a Pretty Cure's resolve is strong, and the lights in their hearts are shining with hope and determination, it amplifies your energy, making you stronger," The Queen explained as clearly as she could, hoping they'd understand.

"Yay! Mid season upgrade! Meow!" Riko chirped happily, also admiring the beauty of the brooch in her hands.

"Awesome! Good timing, too! Oh! That reminds me! Queen! There's something we have to tell you!" Marina wasted no time telling Malgorzata about Zenjin's proposal. The silver haired queen's eyes widened with horror upon hearing about it.

The Queen let out a grim sigh. "I see. If you don't mind, I'd like to join you."

"Really? But don't you have a ton of responsibilities to take care of?" Anzu asked.

"We don't want you to get hurt or even killed," Hotaru said.

"That's why I want to come and fight by your side. He is extremely powerful, and even with the Light Bringers, I'm afraid he may overwhelm you with his almighty powers. I don't want you to get hurt or killed. Plus, I happen to have some experience with combat, so I want to at least be there and assist you. As for my responsibilities, I'll tell Ghislain everything and make some arrangements with him," The Queen explained kindly but grimly. The kids and fairies looked at each other with uneasy faces. As happy as they are with Malgorzata's offer, they don't want her to get caught in the crossfire. "Also, there's something else."

"Something else?" Hotaru asked. She didn't like the doubtful look the queen had in her eyes.

"The Light Bringers. They are powerful, yes. But there is a drawback to using them. You absolutely _cannot_ use them with negative feelings in your heart, like hatred, anger, self-loathing, or bloodlust. The Light Bringers can amplify all of your emotions and turn them into power, but it doesn't discriminate, so negative emotions can be amplified as well, to the point of making you corrupt and go out of control," The Queen explained grimly.

The fairies began trembling. "They'll be corrupted if they use them wrong?!" Lovebeam yelped fearfully.

"Guess...we better be careful with these then," Anzu said as she put hers in one of the pockets on her black goth pants.

Marina swiftly turned to Kyoya. "If you're planning on asking to come with us to the battle again, the answer is still no!"

"But you heard what the Queen just said! If you use the Heart Lighters wrong, they'll corrupt you! How about this? I can keep the Light Bringers in case you need them, and if things get hairy and you need them, I'll throw'em to you!" Kyoya argued.

"That actually sounds like a good plan," Lovebeam said, flying on his shoulder. "Not only that, if Zenjin and the others find out about your new power-ups, they might steal them. I think you should bring Kyo-chan with you. He can watch the Light Bringers and stay out of battle. I can stay with him and fend off any attacks. I don't like fighting so it'll be perfect," Lovebeam explained. "It's not like he's asking to fight or anything. I'm sure he knows how dangerous the situation is."

"She has a point," Moonbeam said.

"I'd rather you stay on Earth. Even with all of that in mind, it's not like Zenjin cares about anything but blowing stuff up and killing people for kicks and giggles!" Marina exclaimed.

"Girls. Did you say Zenjin wanted to battle you in the Grand Desert?" Malgorzata asked.

"Yes," Sunbeam piped in, looking very uneasy.

"I see. That desert is a very big and wide area, with lots of caves, rocks, and trenches where people can hide in. I think we can bring Kyoya so long as he's careful and remains out of sight. I'll arrange for Jervis and Celestia to keep an eye on him and Lovebeam during the battle," Malgorzata told them.

"Thanks for doing this for us, Queen. We really appreciate it," Hotaru told her before bowing politely.

"Don't mention it. I have some things I want to settle with him as well," Malgorzata said. "I'll go talk to my husband now. But do be careful. I don't want you girls getting reckless."

"We'll be careful," Anzu said. As she said this, Riko secretly put her Light Bringer in her pocket.

"The good thing about this battle is that it's on a Saturday," Marina piped in.

"How is that comforting?" Riko asked.

"No school. They don't interrupt our day. Don't plan on duking it out on Earth," Marina added.

"Oh."

* * *

"What happened here?" Zenjin waltzed into Decebal's room, flabbergasted by the wanton destruction.

Instead of seeing a grand, beautiful, well maintained bedroom, he saw a mess that looked like a tornado had gone right through it. Huge chunks of wallpaper were either ripped off the wall or were already hanging off of it by some shreds. Books were scattered all over the place, some in tact, some completely destroyed, and others somewhere in between. The canopy that used to dangle over Decebal's bed was now a pile of shreds. Pillows had been thrown on the floor, with one of them having a huge rip in it, so huge that a big piece of stuffing was peeking out from it. All of Decebal's nice clothes were now piles of fabric shreds. The chandelier that used to hang from the ceiling was now on the floor, with a few glass pieces scattered around it.

Zenjin noticed a small book laying upside down. He picked it up and tried to read it. As usual, he couldn't decipher any of it. With a groan, he threw it on Decebal's desk, with the page he tried to read exposed for anyone who could see it, and left the room.

**Beileag is such a naive little idiot**, the entry wrote. **I can't believe I have to room with that worthless little piece of trash! But then again, it was so easy to manipulate and exploit her. I may hate her to the depths of the universe, but seeing her squirm under my feet truly makes me laugh. She's the perfect chew toy for Zenjin! I wonder why I never used her as a shield whenever the Pretty Cure would attack. I really should have. It's all she's good for. I know how she feels about me, and to be honest, I'd rather eat poison and burn in Tartarus than devote my life to such a naive, featherbrained idiot.**

Zenjin plopped on his bed for a good night's rest, hoping that his battle with the Pretty Cure would go well on his end. He had just about enough of those pesky girls and their ruining his fun. But unbeknownst to him, Decebal and Beileag were in the bottom of the fortress, with yelling and screaming abound.

"You completely destroyed my room, you idiot!"

"Think I care?! You deserved it! I'm sick of you living it up while dragging me through the mud!"

"What are you talking about?! Stop babbling that nonsense!"

"I know what you say about me! I can't believe I ever fell in love with a heartless hypocrite like you!"

* * *

The days leading up to the battle were a blur in the minds of the Pretty Cure and the fairies. Normally, the weekends were something to look forward to. For normal kids, anyway. But the girls and fairies really weren't looking forward to battling Zenjin at 10:00 AM on a Saturday morning. Even they knew that they could die in this battle, no matter how careful they tried to be. The Light Bringers may give them some much needed power boosts, but they couldn't help but wonder if even those would be enough. Malgorzata made the necessary arrangements for Ghislain to handle her responsibilities for the time being.

Finally, they made it to the Grand Desert, which definitely lived up to its name. Nothing lived on it, but it was reasonably cool. The clouds above them were thick, grey, and dark, like they were about to shower rain on them at any moment. There were many rocks and crevices around them. The Pretty Cure and the fairies descended onto the cold, barren ground. Only Riko had her Light Bringer attached to the dark purple bow on her chest.

They were accompanied by Malgorzata, riding on top of Celestia, and her friend, Jervis, the blonde man in the toga, who wielded a katana. Kyoya and Lovebeam hid in a small trench further away, with the rest of the Light Bringers in Kyoya's pocket. The trench was small, but not very noticeable, and it was wide enough for Kyoya to fit his whole wheelchair in.

"I really hope they survive," Lovebeam whispered softly, her long ears trembling, her mind flitting from one bad scenario to another, all of them horrible. "Zenjin could kill them."

With a soft, reassuring smile, Kyoya lifted his hand and stroke Lovebeam's ear. "Don't worry, Lovebeam. The girls are strong. They won't let anyone walk all over them."

But as strongly as he wanted to believe that, even he couldn't prevent his heart from drowning in tsunamis of doubt. The girls may be strong, but Zenjin was even stronger. _'Girls...please...be careful. Don't die! Please!'_ Kyoya squeezed his eyes shut and prayed with his hands folded so tight the tips of his fingers turned white.

"Do you really think we can stand up to him, Queen?" Jervis clutched his katana, shifting from one foot to the next.

"I don't know. But we have to do something," Queen Malgorzata whispered. Celestia whinnied.

All of a sudden, large, black animals fell from the sky, falling onto the various rocks around the area, surrounding them. There were eight total, consisting of a jack rabbit, a tiger, a lion, a badger, a skunk, a polar bear, a fennec fox, and a dodo. Zenjin descended onto the ground about twenty feet away from the Pretty Cure, flanked by a calm Decebal and an irritated Beileag. There was no mistaking the bloodthirsty gleam in his bloody red eyes.

"Okay, people! This annoying little game of cat and mouse ends TODAY!" Zenjin bellowed with a swipe of his arm. The tiger, the lion, and the fennec fox roared as thunder bolted through the sky.

"Why do you have a bunch of monsters with you?! This is supposed to be a duel between us and us only!" Cure Dusk shouted.

"'Cause I feel like it, so get over it!" Zenjin retorted with a snort.

"Girls! Ready?" Cure Starlight edicted with her naginata ready.

"Yes!" The girls and fairies all said in perfect English, in perfect unison.

Cure Twilight put a hand on the Light Bringer on her chest. "Light Bringer. Lend me your strength," Cure Twilight muttered so softly nobody else could hear.

Cure Dusk brought out her bow and arrow. Cure Dawn readied her nunchucks. Queen Malgorzata readied some bows and arrows along with her spear, Jervis his katana, and Cure Twilight her Twilight Ring. The fairies sans Lovebeam enveloped themselves in light. A bolt of thunder resounded through the cloudy sky.

"ATTAAAAACK!" Zenjin screamed at the top of his voice.

Upon hearing the command, all of the animals charged at the Pretty Cure. Cure Twilight was the first to act with a Twilight Masquerade, managing to knock the fennec fox off its feet. Cure Starlight wasted no time giving some kicks and punches to the skunk before taking its tail in her arms and throwing it onto the ground face up.

Cure Dusk landed some heavy punches on the tiger. It tried to bite her with its large fangs, but Cure Dusk managed to punch it in the jaw, sending it flying toward Zenjin, who managed to evade it. Cure Dawn shot flames at the badger and the dodo, making them take a few steps back, stumbling with their tails between their legs. With a loud whinny, Celestia charged at the lion with Malgorzata on her back. The lion swiped at them with its claws but Celestia dodged and ascended into the sky, with Malgorzata leaping off her back and digging the spear into the lion's back, managing to make it dissolve into nothing.

But she noticed something odd. _'No soul orb came out. This isn't a Corrupt Sentinel,'_ Malgorzata thought.

"Starlight Shower!" A rain of stars crashed onto the desert, managing to render all of the animals unable to move. Cure Twilight slashed the jack rabbit with her long claws. But it hopped away before she could do anything else. That was when it happened. Her tail suddenly got longer and wrapped the giant rabbit like it was a snake.

'_When did I learn to do that?'_ Cure Twilight thought before using a Twilight Serenade attack on it, causing the rabbit to dissolve into nothing. She could make use of her tail's new ability. Before she could do anything, Zenjin snuck up on her and tried to slap her with a ball of energy.

"TWILIGHT!" Sunbeam screamed before ramming herself into Zenjin's face, promptly knocking him away from the purple girl. But this noble act didn't satiate Sunbeam's still boiling anger. "This is what you get for what you did to me!"

"Go away, you trash!" Zenjin tried to shoot another ball of energy at her, but Sunbeam deflected it with her own beam of light. His response told her all she needed to know.

"Flame Fist Fury!" Cure Dusk tried to pummel Zenjin with flaming punches, but he evaded them all before kicking Cure Dusk in the stomach, sending her flying into the black dodo. When she got off of it, Jervis slashed the dodo's feathers with his katana.

Cure Dawn slammed the badger with her nunchucks as Moonbeam and Starbeam shot rays of light at it, dissolving it into nothing.

Three down, five to go. Cure Starlight tried to slash the jackrabbit with her naginata, but it kept jumping away before using its legs to jump on her and send her to the ground. The three fairies then surrounded the rabbit and kept it in a round shield so Cure Dawn can use a Dawn Flame on it, dissolving into nothing.

"This is bad! Don't let them beat you, you monsters!" Zenjin commanded as he knocked Cure Twilight out of his way like she was a rag doll.

Queen Malgorzata dredged her spear into the polar bear, making it dissolve into nothing. Then she and Celestia charged at Zenjin. Celestia shot a ray of light into the sky, which in turn caused a huge shower of rainbow colored lights to rain down on the barren land. Zenjin made a dome shield around himself, protecting him from the rain of lights. But he knew he couldn't keep this up forever. The rainbow lights did, however, manage to kill off the skunk, the tiger, the fennec fox, and the dodo, leaving only Zenjin.

Zenjin found himself speechless. He couldn't believe these kids, those pesky fairies, and that annoying queen actually managed to defeat Decebal's army of homemade monsters. They were supposed to be more powerful than Corrupt Sentinels. Then again, the Queen herself was reasonably powerful-even though her piddly powers could never match everything that the Energia was giving him-so she must have trained for this. But he couldn't give up here. If those kids won, he wouldn't be able to fulfill his goal. _'I am GOING to win this duel!'_ He thought before throwing a ball of energy at Cure Starlight, who deflected it with her naginata.

"Hey! They did it!" Kyoya exclaimed happily as he watched the black animals disappear.

"Go get'em, Pretty Cure!" Lovebeam cheered, happy that they were managing to get the upper hand, even if it was just a little bit.

'_I can't let Zenjin win! He's done too much damage to both planets already! If he wins...our family and friends...No! I have to protect them! It's my duty as a Pretty Cure! As a super hero!'_ Cure Twilight thought as she used a Twilight Sparkle on him, which he promptly evaded. But she didn't care.

The resolve in her heart was strong like iron, and she didn't want to give up hope. The winged star brooch on her chest glowed in a golden light, but it was dim.

Now, it was Zenjin against the Pretty Cure, the fairies, Malgorzata, and Jervis. The four girls charged at him, but he blew them all away with a blast of energy. The girls used the wings on their shoes to regain balance in the sky and charged at him again. Cure Dawn tried to slam him with her nunchucks, but he blocked them with his arm. Cure Starlight saw an opening and managed to kick him into a big rock.

Cure Dusk unleashed a barrage of flaming musical notes at him, making the rock erupt into a dust cloud. But Zenjin stormed out of it and fired an array of black energy beams at everyone. The girls all set up their shields to protect themselves as Celestia and Malgorzata stepped in to charge at him. She tried to land a hit on him with her spear, but he kept on evading it, even as they flew into the air. Malgorzata tried again, but the silver haired boy grabbed the spear this time.

"Zenjin! You didn't have to do any of this! Why?! We want answers!" Malgorzata exclaimed. Celestia whinnied in agreement.

"I don't have to tell you anything!" Zenjin bellowed as he yanked Malgorzata's spear out and threw it away. But the fairies, Lovebeam included, managed to grab it to keep it from breaking. Zenjin tried to fly away, but Malgorzata grabbed his arm. "What?!"

"We want to know! Why did you do all of this?! Did we do something wrong? We saved you from that woman and gave you everything she never did! Aren't you happy you're free from her clutches once and for all?" Malgorzata pleaded. Zenjin could see the desperate, pleading look in her eyes, like she was about to cry. But he fired a beam of light at her, sending her flying off of Celestia. Thankfully, the alicorn managed to fly under her and catch her before anything bad could happen.

"No! I won't stop until I do what I want! All you wanna do is keep me in chains and tie me down like a house pet!" Zenjin bellowed, leaving himself open for a Twilight Masquerade attack. Surprisingly for Zenjin, he couldn't dodge it this time, and it actually hit him quite hard to the point of making him fall to the ground.

The only problem was, he fell right in front of the trench Kyoya and Lovebeam are hiding in. Actually, Lovebeam is on the battlefield right now giving Malgorzata's spear back to her. Kyoya hid in the trench, keeping himself silent, praying to God that Zenjin won't spot him or catch him.

'_Please! Please! Please! Let him not see me! Make him not see me! Make him go back to the battle! If he sees me I'm dead!'_ Kyoya prayed desperately for Zenjin to not see him and return to the battle.

Unfortunately for Kyoya, his prayers weren't answered. He felt something grip his neck extremely tight, cutting off his airway. He could feel himself being lifted out of the trench. His feet didn't touch the ground.

"Why do you follow me?!" Zenjin growled as he pressed his tight fingers around Kyoya's neck, cutting off his airway. Kyoya scratched at his arms, trying desperately to make him release him, but it didn't work. "You don't exist, you trash! Are you mocking me?! Do you exist to tell me that I'll forever be weak, helpless, and vulnerable?! You're wrong! I am Zenjin! The strongest, most powerful human being in the world!"

The hair on Cure Twilight's neck stood up in alarm. Her purple cat ears picked up the sound of Zenjin's yelling and Kyoya's labored breathing. She turned around to find a horrible sight.

Zenjin was trying to suffocate Kyoya to death.

Kyoya was struggling to break free.

It hit Cure Twilight like a freight train. If she didn't save Kyoya, he could die. If he died...she'd hate Zenjin forever. If she lost the first friend she ever made, it would be all his fault.

All his fault.

The star brooch on her chest turned black. Time felt like it stopped around her. She found herself sprinting toward Zenjin.

Before Zenjin could squeeze the life out of Kyoya, he felt an extremely powerful blow to his face, sending him flying into a big rock, releasing Kyoya. Once his airway was free, Kyoya gasped for breath and coughed at the same time. But he turned around to find Cure Twilight standing a few feet away from the frazzled Zenjin.

But something about her didn't seem right.

"Kyo-chan!" Moonbeam and Lovebeam all flew to the boy with worry painted all over their faces.

"Are you okay?!" Moonbeam cried.

"Yeah. For now," Kyoya said with a cough.

Zenjin couldn't believe what he saw. The purple Pretty Cure standing before him now had cold, lifeless green eyes, filled to the brim with nothing but hatred for him, even though her face was completely devoid of any kind of human emotion or warmth. The brooch on her chest was radiating a cold, black light. Zenjin wiped some blood off his mouth.

"You're not so tough! Take this!" Zenjin shot a ball of energy at her, but she not only deflected it with her claws, but she shot it right back at him. He managed to dodge, but part of his cape got burned. He tried to shoot another energy beam at her, but Cure Twilight suddenly punched him in the jaw, sending him flying.

Even in the air, she leaped toward him and delivered a flurry of punches and kicks. Zenjin only barely managed to evade and deflect some, but wound up getting hit with a few of them. At one point she punched him in the stomach, rendering him unable to breathe.

The feeling was unmistakable.

_She_ used to beat him like a punching bag before.

Even the other Pretty Cure and the queen were rendered speechless. "Hooray! Cure Twilight's winning!" Sunbeam flapped her little arms up and down, flitting all around the girls quite cheerfully.

Everyone else, however, had doubt and fear written all over their faces. "No! Something's wrong! She's usually not that powerful!" Cure Dawn stammered fearfully.

"Should we stop her?" Moonbeam asked.

Even Zenjin didn't like what he saw. He fired many energy beams at her, but she deflected them all like they were nothing. He created a huge ball of fire, so big that it could be the size of five whole elephants put together in one room. Once it was finished, he fired it at the purple girl. It hit her, and the area around her exploded.

"Twilight!" The girls and fairies cried with horror, fearing the worst.

"Hah! FINALLY! Serves you right you trash! You don't deserve to-!" He wanted to gloat, but instead of being rewarded with the sweet scent of victory, he found himself face to face with one of Riko's fists, finding himself being thrown onto the barren floor. He opened his eyes to find Cure Twilight completely unhurt by his attack.

'_No way! That should have completely killed her!'_ Zenjin yelled. "Decebal! Beileag! It's time for the big...guns…" Zenjin turned around and screamed for Decebal and Beileag to help him out...only to find absolutely nothing behind him. Just the rest of the desert.

Decebal and Beileag weren't there.

All of the anger drained right out of him then and there. For a moment, he thought he was hallucinating. But he wasn't. Decebal and Beileag were gone. Nowhere to be found. His red eyes slowly grew large with a nasty combination of confusion, shock, and horror.

They're gone. Gone. Just like that. Where are they? He didn't know. "Decebal? Beileag? Are you there?" He asked, thinking they're preparing for an epic sneak attack. That had to be it. His eyesight began to blur. Cure Twilight smashed him against a rock again.

"What's...what's happening?!" Zenjin stammered fearfully. His whole body trembled at the mercy of the purple cat girl. His eyes were wide with horror, his lips dry and cracked, and he was unable to even so much as fire another ball of energy at her, even though he could easily do so. He looked around helplessly.

Decebal and Beileag had to be there! They just had to be! "Decebal?! Beileag?! Where are you?!" Zenjin cried helplessly, like a little kid lost in a crowd looking for his mother.

He cowered when he saw Cure Twilight again. Standing a few feet away, with the same emotionless but hateful look on her face, the brooch on her chest black as night. She no longer looked like a noble, valiant superhero kicking his butt for the greater good. To Zenjin, she was someone else. Someone he feared more than anything in the whole world. For a moment, he thought she was the woman.

"What _is_ she…?!"

"What the-?! She had her Light Bringer this whole time?!" Cure Dawn yelped as she helped Kyoya back into his wheelchair after the fairies put it on the ground with their magic.

"I was wondering why she never gave it to me!" Kyoya exclaimed. Even he didn't like what Riko became, even if she lost it because he was in danger. As happy as he was that she saved his life, if this was what it's turning her into with the Light Bringer being corrupted...someone had to do something. Even Zenjin looked like he was going to pee his pants.

Cure Twilight readied her claws. Zenjin, scared and sitting on the ground, looked all around himself. He found himself so scared that he was unable to use his powers to kill the girl, even though he could easily do so. Decebal and Beileag had to be somewhere! They had to save him! Zenjin wished, no, violently prayed that this had to be the case, that they were just hiding. But why aren't they coming out?

"STAY AWAAAAY!" Zenjin yelled, but the purple cat girl paid him absolutely no heed and kept charging. Zenjin had to do something. But what? Decebal and Beileag aren't there to help him even though they should be.

Cure Starlight and the fairies charged to try and stop Cure Twilight, but she was too fast for them. Cure Dawn set up a barrier in front of her, but with one kick she smashed it to pieces. Cure Dusk fired some flames in front of her to make her get away, but she leaped right over them.

Closer, closer, closer she charged at him. Zenjin had to do something, but his body couldn't move. He couldn't use his powers. What could he do?

All of a sudden, an image of the evil woman flashed over Cure Twilight.

With a loud scream, he fired a ball of black energy right at Cure Twilight's face, finally stopping her in her tracks, leaving her frozen with a shocked and confused look on her face. Without bothering to see what he had done, he felt himself able to move again, and wasted absolutely no time flying away from the scene, screaming hysterically like he was going absolutely mad.

"Twilight!"

Cure Twilight fell to the ground, her whole body in grayscale. Her eyes were wide with fear. Her mouth was open just a little bit. She was dormant and unmoving. Kyoya managed to crawl back to his wheelchair and with a great heave, pulled himself back into it. Everyone scurried over to the fallen Cure.

Cure Dawn put her hands on her friend and shook her like she was trying to wake her up. "Twilight! Wake up! What happened to you?! Come on! Wake up! Please!" The desperation in her voice amplified with each time she yelled her friend's name.

Malgorzata glanced at Cure Twilight's Light Bringer. It was black. "Oh no. She's been corrupted, and that spell Zenjin cast on her must have put her in a kind of sleep."

"Is there any way we can wake her up?!" Cure Dusk wailed, her reddening face warm from too much fighting, her golden eyes pink with dust.

Malgorzata shook her head. Cure Dusk took a few steps back. With a roar, she flung both of her arms around, unknowingly shooting some flames out. One of them almost hit Cure Starlight had she not managed to evade it.

"Be careful, Dusk! You almost scorched me!" Cure Starlight yelped, covering herself with her arms.

Cure Dusk gave Starlight a furious glare and grabbed a good chunk of her shirt. "Seriously, Star?! Our friend's in a coma and probably gonna die and you're more worried about getting a third degree burn?!"

"Dusk! Calm down!" Moonbeam stammered worriedly. Cure Starlight gently pried Cure Dusk's hand off of her shirt and set her down. "There's gotta be a way to save her! There just has to be!"

Kyoya glanced at her Light Bringer. It was pitch black, except for the wings. He put his hand on it and tried to pull it off. It felt like a rock was superglued to her. He grunted and heaved and pulled with all his might. He needed to get it off at all costs. For Riko's sake. Unfortunately, his arms gave out, and he couldn't pull on it. His eyes began to blur. Never had he been so concerned for one of his dearest friends. "Riko...wake up...please..."

Everyone was at a loss as to what to do. Moonbeam glanced at everyone, silently begging for a way to save their friend. But as it turned out, the answer was right in front of her.

Moonbeam pointed at the girls, her ears twitching. "The Light Bringers!"

"What?" Jervis yelped, almost dropping his katana. He clumsily managed to catch it before it could slice his foot.

Starbeam caught on and pulled the Light Bringers out of Kyoya's pocket. "Here!" Starbeam handed the Light Bringers to each Pretty Cure.

Anzu caught on and nodded. "Let's use them to get them back!"

"How?!" Marina exclaimed, confused.

"I get it! Girls! Pray with all your might!" Cure Starlight commanded as she held the Light Bringer to her heart and closed her eyes. _'Riko...please come back. Don't lose yourself to the darkness!'_ Cure Starlight prayed.

'_Riko! We're here for you! I know you can hear us! Come back! We're begging you!'_ Anzu prayed.

'_You better come back, Riko! I won't forgive you if you die!'_ Marina prayed.

'_Do not succumb to the darkness or your bad memories! You simply must return to the land of the living! Your family and friends will be ever so crushed if you don't return safely!'_ Starbeam prayed, with her hands on Hotaru's Light Bringer.

'_I should never have been so judgmental when we first met! You've been so nice to me! I can't lose one of the few people who actually understand me! Don't give up, Riko-chan!'_ Lovebeam prayed desperately, her hand on Anzu's Light Bringer.

Kyoya, Sunbeam, and Moonbeam all put their hands on Hotaru's Light Bringer, closed their eyes, and prayed.

The Light Bringers all glowed in a radiant white light, shining like stars in the darkest of night.

* * *

When Riko opened her eyes, she saw nothing but darkness. There wasn't a single spec of light to be seen. Despite her body being weak from the battle, Riko managed to force herself on her feet. But the pitch black darkness around her caused her to put her hands on her chest. She clutched the bow on her shirt just to make sure she was feeling something.

She trembled as she looked all around herself nervously. "Where am I?"

No. She couldn't be scared. Riko took in a deep breath before letting it out. She still trembled, but she needed to keep calm. Being scared wasn't going to help her out. She needed to take action. But there was nothing here. Where could she even start?

Perhaps an attack could work? She raised her hand into the air. "Twilight Ring!"

Her trusted weapon didn't come forth.

Riko pulled her hand down. "Aww. That didn't work. Twilight Serenade!"

Nothing.

"Twilight Masquerade?"

That didn't work either.

"Awww! I can't just sit here! My friends need me!" Riko complained before panting a little. "Calm down, Riko. Calm down. Complaining won't get you anywhere. You need to think. Maybe this is some kind of test," Riko rationalized. "Yeah! Like in some of those anime! If you pass it, you can see your friends and family again."

As calm as Riko was right now, her insides were doing back flips, struggling to even so much as make sense of this whole situation. She wasn't sure how she was plunged into this darkness, but she knew she needed to get back to reality. But how? That was the question.

Riko's eyes blurred, clutching the ribbon on her chest tightly to match up with the fact that her chest tightened with worry. "My friends...they must be worried about me..."

_"What friends?"_

Riko turned around, alert and alarmed. Where did that voice come from? There was no one else here. "Who's there?!"

But in the back of her mind, she already knew. She'd recognize that voice anywhere.

A cluster of light appeared before her. The lights all clumped together to form a single image: a woman. The woman had scraggly brown hair, matching eyes that exuded no warmth nor kindness, wearing a simple white blouse and a brown skirt, with matching high heels. The woman stared at Riko like she was catching her doing something she shouldn't have.

Riko froze. She started shaking her hands to get the knotted feeling out of her stomach, but it proved futile. Oh no. Not her. Anyone but her.

"Akamatsu...sensei?"

_"In the flesh,"_ Ms. Akamatsu sneered, crossing her arms. She had an imposing, domineering aura about her, complete with a smug smile that showed that she wasn't going to tolerate any excuses or nonsense.

Riko clutched the ribbon on her chest tighter. She took a few steps back, her eyes widening and her legs close to buckling. No. She couldn't let herself be scared. This had to be some kind of dream. Akamatsu's supposed to be back in Yokosuka. What was she doing here?

"Are you still deluding yourself, child?" Ms. Akamatsu asked. _"You troublesome little girl. Are you still convinced any sane person would want to be friends with someone like you?" _Akamatsu put a hand on her hip, proud of her shapely figure. _"Nobody likes a picky crybaby who can't even learn to stop being selfish."_

Selfish? Riko balled her fist. Something snapped inside her. Who did this woman think she was? Acting like Riko was some kind of perpetual troublemaker. If there was anything Riko hated more than anything, it was having words put in her mouth.

And hypocrisy.

She knew hypocrisy like she knew about Moomins. She even looked the word hypocrite up on the computer once. A hypocrite is someone who pretends to have morals and virtues but is actually a bad person when no one's looking, preaching about following the rules but breaking them.

Riko pointed a finger at Ms. Akamatsu boldly. "That describes you more than anything! You're the one who's selfish!" It was rude to point fingers, but at this point, Riko didn't care. She had wanted to do this for years now. Call her out on her treachery.

Now she finally got her chance.

_"I don't cry at every little thing. I don't flap my hands or cover my ears or hit myself on the head every time I raise my voice. Do you do anything besides act like a toddler and whine to get what you want? No. You wonder why you don't have any friends,"_ Ms. Akamatsu hissed.

Riko's blood was boiling. There she goes again, acting like she knows her when she doesn't. Riko always hated that. Riko knew she had her occasional selfish moments at times, but it wasn't like she was completely inconsiderate of other people.

That described Akamatsu more than anything.

Riko took her hands off her chest and balled her fists, digging her nails into her palms.

You can do this, Riko.

If you can stand up to Marina (before she turned nice) and a kid who can destroy entire planets, then an illusion of a mean teacher should be no problem.

For some reason, Riko felt oddly safe. Was it because she had friends now? That she was older? She wasn't sure. She knew this much though: It felt...good.

You can do it.

Face your fears. Call them out.

Take control. Pluck that thorn out.

Riko stared Ms. Akamatsu right in the eye. "You can't hurt me."

Ms. Akamatsu took a step back.

"I know what you really are. You're an illusion. I can see right through you. Also, one of your hands is flickering."

Ms. Akamatsu looked down at her left hand. It flickered on and off like a dying light bulb. Riko crossed her arms. "You better listen up, and listen good!"

Riko wanted to follow Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina's examples. If they can live their lives the way they wanted to, standing up for themselves and not caring about what others think, then why couldn't she?

No more fear.

"I'm not a brat, like you're so convinced I am. I don't behave the way I do because I want attention or cause trouble. Those are just habits I need to work on. I can't control them, and I can't get rid of them, but they don't mean I'm bad," Riko kept her voice calm and collected. She was dying to yell, but she wanted to wait first. Build it up. Hit it where it hurts. "If anything, you're the one who's bad! I don't know what kind of life you had, and whatever happened to you, I'm not interested. But you are NOT what makes me Riko, nor does my autism make me Riko!"

Ms. Akamatsu backpedaled, like she had seen a ghost.

Riko pointed an index finger at her chest, glaring at the illusion with blazing fury. "_I am what makes me Riko_! You don't get to decide who or what I am! I don't know why you always nitpicked at everything I did and acted like I was some kind of bad kid!"

_"I...I was doing it for your own good! You needed to follow the rules, like a good kid!"_

That only added more fuel to the fire. As much as Riko hated hypocrisy and lies, she hated people's flimsy excuses even more.

"Me?! Follow the rules?! Don't you remember my first day at Kashino?! You went over the rules pasted on the wall! First rule: be nice to each other and get along! You broke that rule! Not once, not twice, but all the time! I followed the rules! You didn't! It's basic human decency! Didn't it ever occur to you that I wasn't bad?! Didn't it ever occur to you to even look up what autism was on the computer?! Or even to TRY to be nice and understand me?! Teachers help kids, not pick favorites and treat me like I'm an alien about to suck your brains!"

"You were going down the wrong path! You have no future without me!"

"Oh, really?" Riko crossed her arms. "Look at the future I actually got! I went to better schools! I have friends now! Friends and family who love me for me and don't mind that I'm a little on the weird side! I even got chosen to become a magical girl superhero!" Ms. Akamatsu shuddered. "And you know what?! _**I'm HAPPY!**_ I'm happy being me! I'm happy, but you're probably miserable and sad!"

_"BUT I NEVER DEALT WITH KIDS LIKE YOU BEFORE! IT WAS ALL I KNEW!"_

"And all I knew back then was that you were being cruel and I felt worse than dirt. All my parents knew about me was that I had some problems that needed to be worked around. Did they constantly belittle me, act like I was a brain sucking alien, and make me feel worse than dirt? No! No they didn't! All they did was love me with all their heart!"

With every sentence she shouted, Riko could feel herself becoming lighter than even the feathers of a baby bird. She didn't know she had it in her. She didn't know she could even put all of this into coherent words. But she was on a roll, and she wasn't done yet. A light was shining in her heart, and she was going to make it shine brighter.

Twilight Cat would do the same.

"I used to hate myself. I never wanted to feel confident or believe in myself because whenever I did, you'd get angry and say that I don't deserve to be so full of myself or that I cheated. You told me that a selfish girl like me didn't deserve friends or to be happy, and that nothing I did would ever be worth anything! That describes you more than anything! My happiness is like a knife through your heart, isn't it? All this time...you've hung over my life like a stormy rain cloud, denying me everything that you always wanted."

Riko kept staring into her eyes. Ms. Akamatsu wasn't angry, nor was she depressed. For once, she looked the same way Riko did whenever the real Ms. Akamatsu would scold her or blow something out or proportion: small, scared, and wretched. In fact, Ms. Akamatsu actually shrank in size. She became a little shorter than Riko. She started flickering.

"You have no idea how much you hurt me! I've been alone, I've had to see therapists for five years straight, and you convinced me I was worthless! But more than anything...I want to thank you. For showing me what a hypocrite looks like. You can't control me anymore. Face the truth for once! Now get out!" Riko pointed to the sky. "I don't ever want to see your face ever again!"

_ZAP!_ With that, the illusion broke into a cluster of lights that dissipated into the darkness.

A yellow light appeared in front of Riko. _"Riko! Can you hear me?! Wake up! Please!"_

"Kyo-chan?!"

Two more appeared. Then many more. _"Riko-chan! Don't give up! Please come back!"_ Moonbeam.

_"Come on! Fight through it! We know you can do it!"_ Sunbeam.

"_Come back, Riko! We love you!" _Lovebeam.

"_Riko! Get back here!"_ Marina.

"_We're waiting for you!"_ Hotaru.

"_We still have some hanging out to do!"_ Anzu.

"_Never give up hope! The light will always keep shining if you let it!"_ Starbeam.

All of the spheres of light circled around a confused but relieved Riko faster than the speed of a race car. Suddenly, a blinding flash penetrated the darkness.

* * *

Finally, the color returned to Riko's entire body, and the catatonic look on her face practically vanished. Cure Twilight woke with a start. Her head was throbbing, and she stroke her hair, hoping to alleviate the pain.

"Ow...what hit me?" Riko murmured. As soon as Kyoya saw her reawaken, he just couldn't contain his joy, leaping on Riko like he hadn't seen her in decades.

"You're back! You're alright! Woohoo!" Kyoya glomped Riko and sent her to the ground, with Moonbeam and Sunbeam joining in. Riko found herself quite flummoxed. But she felt a huge sense of warmth and comfort envelop her, like nothing she ever experienced, not even from her own parents. Happily, her own joy bubbled over and embraced her sweet friends.

"Woohoo! We did it!" Marina cheered and high fived Anzu while Hotaru smiled and put her naginata away.

'_It worked. I'm so happy I could cry...'_ Hotaru thought. _'Is this what it's like to worry for a friend?'_ She asked herself. She knew she had never been so emotional before until now.

After this, Celestia waved her horn, sending the girls home in a white light. Malgorzata and Jervis got on Celestia's back and the alicorn ascended into the sky, onward to Malgorzata's castle.

This shouldn't have happened. It shouldn't have. But it did, and all Zenjin could do was run through the barren wasteland of the planet he decimated, desolate and depressed, like he is now.

Run. That was all his body knew to do right now. His lungs were burning, his eyes were filled to the brim with fear, his legs throbbed, and he took huge gasps of breaths with every step he took.

* * *

He didn't expect any of this to happen.

They should have won. Zenjin had every advantage going for him. He had the Energia within him, giving him powers that no human being should ever be able to possess, putting him on the same level as God himself. He could wipe them out with just a snap of his fingers! Decebal and Beileag were there. They would wear them down so he could oversee everything, just to see those deliciously abject faces, to teach them that their suffering was petty compared to his.

Why didn't it turn out like that?

Instead, Cure Twilight became consumed with a lust for his blood, pummeling him every chance she got, all because he tried to suffocate her friend. The Pretty Cure and the Queen literally wiped out every single monster Decebal created, punching them and slashing them into oblivion like they were cheese being forced through a grater. Zenjin could have done away with them, but his body froze. He looked to Decebal and Beileag for help, but they were gone. Poof. Disappeared, just like that, like they were never there. He saw the fury in Cure Twilight's eyes, the cat eared girl zooming in on him with absolute bloodlust and hatred consuming her every being.

He knew that look all too well.

_She_ always donned that look when she was about to pummel him.

Right then and there, one of his legs unknowingly stuck into a little pothole, causing him to finally trip and fall flat on his face. His arm ran against the gravel, leaving a huge scab on it, making a mixture of dirt and blood. But he didn't pull himself back up right then. He just continued to lay on the barren ground of Rozaniela, his face buried in his skinny arms. All of this had to be a dream. It just had to be! He wished with all of his hollow chest cavity that it was all a cruel joke, that Beileag and Decebal were still here, that he wiped out those pesky Pretty Cure. Everything just had to be fine!

But even he couldn't deny this cold, unforgiving reality.

"Decebal...Beileag...where are you…?" Zenjin whimpered like an abandoned puppy, struggling to get back on his feet. But his skinny arms could barely hold him up, as the energy he once had was sucked right out of him. It didn't help that his legs felt like lumpy plum pudding from too much running, soaking in some kind of warm, awful smelling liquid.

Zenjin's nostrils finally caught the repulsive scent. A repulsive, noisome aroma he knew all too well. But it had to be an illusion. With his left arm, he slowly stroke his black pants just a little bit, held his fingers to his face, and briefly smelt the aroma, to see if it was really what he knew it was-what he desperately wished wasn't there.

Unfortunately for him, it was.

"_You did it again, didn't you?!"_

The evil woman's voice boomed in his brain, causing him to moan and put both hands on the sides of his silver hair covered head. He let out strange moans as he shook his head vigorously.

_'Get out! Get out!'_ Zenjin yelled in his head. _'Get out! You don't exist!'_

"Decebal! Beileag! Help me! Please come back!" Zenjin pleaded like a scared child, lost in a place he didn't know, all alone. Without anyone to protect him. His eyes blurred, and warm tears poured out down his chafing cheeks. "I...I don't want to be alone!"

No matter how strongly he wished, pleaded, begged, or cried, the woman and the painful memories came back in torrents in which he found himself drowning, unable to see any light permeating the surface, if there was a surface at all. All of a sudden, he lost himself in his mind. He found his younger self getting dragged out of the rickety old house rather violently by the hair, the fat woman's chubby, floppy arms shoving him into a little dog house, with him wearing nothing but a sleeveless shirt and shorts, no shoes, no socks, nothing. The bitter cold stung every single skin cell he had, and the woman kicked him deeper inside with her thick cleats. It didn't help that the growling in his stomach amplified with every moment that passed.

"_Get in there, you trash!"_

"Decebal! Beileag!" Zenjin looked all around him, hoping his saviors would come and rescue him. But there was not a soul to be seen. "No! Get away from me! You don't exist!" He yelled to no one in particular.

He found himself unable to breathe, just like that one day, when the woman caught him trying to eat some lunch meat in their shiny new black refrigerator. The woman pinned him to the ground, sat on him, with a hand clutching his shirt, with nothing but absolute hatred and fury consuming her every being. Zenjin couldn't breathe, as the large woman was sitting quite hard on his stomach.

"_I wish you were NEVER BORN!"_ She shouted right to his face, her nose touching his, her spit shooting onto Zenjin's face. Then another slap. _"YOU'RE A CURSE!"_ She shouted before striking him again. _"I HATE YOU! YOU TOOK MY DAUGHTER AWAY!"_ More slaps. It seemed to go on forever.

The evil woman. Decebal. Beileag. The Energia. Sunbeam. Rozaniela in ruins. The old house. The dog house. The blizzards. The beatings. The constant yelling, name calling, and humiliation. Everything flashed through his mind like a freight train.

"STOP IIIIIT! MAKE IT STOOOP! DECEBAAAAL! BEILEAAAAAG!" Zenjin screamed to the sky, his voice resounding in the birdless, cloudless air, leaving only a faint echo that faded just as quickly as it appeared. He found himself falling to the dirt again, heaving. Sniveling. Sobbing quietly. The memories morphed into a faint glimmer.

"Please...don't leave me all alone…" All of a sudden, he found himself glowing, spiraling down a tunnel of light, and falling into a well maintained forest, bathing in orange light. But he didn't care. With all the energy he had, he pulled himself back to his feet and trudged through the thick forest. He ambled through the forest, wandering aimlessly, with blank, jaded, world weary red eyes. Soon, his legs gave out and he fell to his knees. That was when the realization hit him with a cruel blow.

"It looks like...I really am all alone…" Zenjin whispered so low he could barely hear himself. He looked up at the tree filled sky with jaded eyes as a loud, bloodcurdling scream resounded all through the forest. Not a soul was there to hear it.


	28. Billie's Resolve

**Author's Note: Beileag will live, though I don't know what I should do with her now that I'm keeping her alive. I have new plans for later chapters, none of which will have unsavory elements. Look forward to it!**

**_ATTENTION: TRIGGER WARNING FOR CHILD ABUSE AND ANIMAL DEATH!_**

Chapter 26: I Have To Make Amends! Billie's Resolve.

On Earth, in a small but thick forest, a man and a woman dressed in park ranger outfits walked through some shrubs. The man, in his late sixties, was wearing a light blue shirt, black pants, a beige cowboy hat, black boots, and has a small musket and a black walkie talkie on him. The woman, in her thirties with flowy red hair, was wearing a short sleeved green shirt, black pants, brown boots, and has a black walkie talkie on her.

"Looks like everything's quiet so far. But you can never be too careful," The man said.

"Yeah," The women said. As soon as she leaned in, however, a repulsive odor made her hands fly onto her nose. She was so mortified by the awful smell that she almost slipped on a twig. Her face contorted with disgust. "Ugh! What stinks?!"

"Must be deer poop or something-Whoa!" The man said before almost tripping. He managed to regain his balance, so he didn't get hurt. "What's this?" He nervously looked down.

An unconscious person was lying face down in front of him, with long silver hair, and a body covered in a long red cape, with part of it being burned. What in the world was someone doing in a place like this? And unconscious, no less! Was he dead? Injured? Sick?

The man kneeled down and turned the child over. "Hey! You alright, kid? Wake up!" The man pleaded before the repulsive smell assaulted his nostrils. The kid didn't wake up, even as the man put his hands on his nose.

"Hello? We need an ambulance! There's a child lying here unconscious!" The woman exclaimed in a walkie talkie.

The man put two fingers on the boy's neck. Much to his relief, the kid was alive. Soon, some paramedics arrived with a gurney, took him to the ambulance, and rushed him to Shining Light Hospital. They removed the boy's soiled clothes and put him in a clean hospital gown. A doctor put an oxygen mask on his face, while a younger nurse put an IV in his arms.

"It doesn't look like anything serious. It seems he's just passed out," The doctor said to the nurse before putting on his stethoscope and checking his heartbeat.

_Lub dub. Lub dub. Lub dub. Lub dub._

The doctor smiled. The boy's heart was beating normally. No signs of a heart murmur or any other potential cardiovascular problems.

"I've never seen a child with silver hair before. But what in the world was he doing all alone in the forest?" The confused nurse gripped her name tag tightly.

"I don't know. Some park rangers found him. He might be a runaway. I'll call Child Protective Services and see if they can find anything on him."

"Urgh…" The boy groaned as he found himself waking up to bright lights and pristine white walls. He held a hand up to his face to adjust to the light.

"Oh! You're awake!" The doctor said softly with a smile as he approached the boy. "I'm Dr. Tezuka. You're in a hospital right now. We'll take good care of you."

He figured there'd be some ruckus, but he sure didn't expect the boy to scream at the top of his lungs, rip everything off his body, and kick some medicine bottles all over the floor. The doctor and the nurse recoiled as soon as the medicine bottles either shattered or clattered to the floor, rolling into the hall. Others stopped to listen to the commotion, either flabbergasted, confused, nervous, or just wondering what was going on in there.

"Call security! Security!" The nurse shouted in desperation.

Not only that, the boy suddenly glowed in a black light. Before anyone could do anything, the entire room exploded, and the boy flew out of there without a scratch on him, leaving behind a discarded hospital gown. The hospital room was now a huge pile of debris, with people inside screaming in pain.

"It hurts! Aaaagh!"

"Someone help!"

"Do something! Quick!" People, both doctors and patients, found themselves horrified. Some doctors still rushed inside to save whoever's inside.

As for Zenjin, he flew onto a rooftop, snapped his fingers, and created a brand new version of his outfit. Black shirt, black pants, red boots, a purple neck ruffle, a gold diadem, black fingerless gloves, and a beige vest. With another snap of his fingers, he teleported right back to Rozaniela with one thing in mind: finding Decebal and Beileag.

He flew all over the place, dying to find them. He searched all over. Over mountains, through woods, across oceans, no sign of them at all. His anxiety amassed within his heart, like someone is dumping a big pile of bricks on him. He even found it hard to breathe at times.

'_Decebal...Beileag...where are you? Why did you leave me there?'_ Zenjin kept on asking himself. After what seemed to be hours, he descended onto a small, grassless area with a huge lake. He never did care for Rozaniela.

Something darted across the other side of the lake. Something brightly colored. With indigo hair. Zenjin gasped. "Billie!"

Beileag gasped and tried to outrun him, but Zenjin caught up with her and grabbed her arm. "Billie! Where did you go?!"

Beileag tried to pry Zenjin's hand off of her, to no avail. Why did she look angry? Scared, even? She was never scared of him before. "Go away!"

Zenjin donned a confused look. "Why? Why did you and Decebal leave?" Beileag made the mistake of making eye contact with him. He looked so sad, like an abandoned puppy. She pitied him, yes, but she didn't love him. How could she possibly love someone like Zenjin? Especially after all that he did.

Beileag turned away from him. "I can't stand it anymore! I'm sick of you and Decebal treating me like I'm your punching bag! I have a life to live!"

Zenjin's eyes flared. "You're nothing without me and Decebal! Come back with me!" He tried to grab her once more.

"Stay away from me!" Beileag roared and found herself smacking Zenjin across the face, stunning him into silence.

Zenjin didn't like the scornful look she was giving him. It reminded him too much of that woman.

The fury in her eyes was unmistakable. "You don't own me. I'd rather spend my life in jail than deal with you even for a second longer."

With that, a tearful Beileag ran away from the lake, leaving a heartbroken Zenjin all alone. He just stood there, immobile, for a few minutes as Beileag made herself scarce.

A laugh escaped his mouth. Not a merry laugh. The laugh belonging to someone who had given up. "...so you're leaving me here, huh?" With a sad chuckle, a single tear streamed out of one of his eyes. "Fine! Leave me all alone for all I care! I never liked you anyway! You're a piece of trash! Even worse than trash! If you were gonna do this to me from the beginning, then you should never have been born! I HATE YOU!" Zenjin screamed as he fired an energy ball at the lake, sending water flying all over the place, leaving him sopping wet.

Like he cared.

An image of himself as a young kid sitting in a dog house wearing nothing but a shirt and shorts in a blizzard flashed through his mind. The child was crying, holding his little fists in front of his face. _"Don't leave me all alone! I don't wanna be alone!"_

Zenjin fell to his knees and breathed heavily, like something was obstructing his airway. No more Decebal. No more Beileag. The implications of Beileag's betrayal told him one thing.

The very thing he feared the most.

"Alone…" He put a hand to his mouth and fell on the ground.

(flashback)

_A younger Zenjin-about seven years old-ambled past a bench with a box on it. He needed to get home early or else that woman would pummel him again. He didn't want to risk yet another beating. He wasn't sure if he could endure another one. Would there ever be a day where he wouldn't get yelled at or beaten? Zenjin didn't think so._

_He heard a mewing sound. Curious, he leaned into the box to find a small grey kitten rolling around inside. The kitten stopped upon seeing Zenjin, looking at him curiously with it's large, golden brown eyes. Zenjin wondered if the kitten was looking at the eye patch and gauze around his left eye. Or the metal cast on his middle finger on his right hand. Or the band-aid on his nose. Or the purple bruise on his chin. _

_The kitten suddenly hopped onto the ground, causing the box to fall behind it. The kitten rubbed itself against Zenjin's legs happily, like it was happy to see him. Without any emotion, Zenjin just picked it up. He did like how the kitten rubbed itself against his chest._

_A warm feeling crept into his chest as the kitten snuggled up against him, stimulating the appearance of a smile. "Don't worry, little guy. I'll be your friend," _

_He picked the kitten up to see if it was a boy or a girl. She was a girl. "I'll call you Tove. I heard it somewhere and I like it, so you're Tove!" Zenjin exclaimed. The kitten mewed in response, happy with the name._

_He took Tove home with him, hiding him in the abandoned dog house the woman would shove him in if he did something wrong, like sneak food out from the refrigerator or use the toilet. The woman wasn't home right now, so he found it safe to do whatever he wanted, for both himself and for Tove. He couldn't believe he found himself so infatuated with this hyper little gray ball of energy. _

_But he liked the way Tove would accept the scraps he'd give her, the way she'd roll around on the grass, her ability to catch mice and birds, how fast she'd run when she'd chase them, the happy meows full of gratitude she'd give when he would play with her, the way she'd purr when she's happy, how nice she felt when she would sit on his lap, the way she'd lick his wounds when the woman would punish him for...whatever. Zenjin felt a warm and loving glow envelop his heart. He wasn't sure what it was, but whatever it was, he liked it, and Tove was responsible for it. His love for Tove grew with each day that passed, going on for quite a long time. For the first time in his whole life, he was happy. Overjoyed._

_Unfortunately, it was also criminally short._

_When Zenjin came home one day, he found that little Tove isn't in the dog house. He called out to her wherever he went. "Tove! Tove? Where are you, Tove? Come on out! I have some rice from school!" Zenjin yelled for her, but Tove didn't come out, and whenever he'd come visit her, she'd always greet him with happy meows and nuzzling his legs. _

_This was strange. It wasn't like Tove to not hear him. Where could she be?He looked through the house. Under the couch, under the TV, under the dining room table, in the kitchen, nothing._

_Then he went upstairs._

"_Tove-" Zenjin tried to call out to her as he went upstairs, but didn't find his furry little friend. Instead, he saw a big, red, angry marshmallow of a woman, complete with bloodshot eyes and grinding teeth. _

_In one of her hands was a limp, lifeless gray kitten. She opened her hand, causing the kitten to fall to the ground. Thud. Tove's neck looked like it had been stretched to the point where her neck broke. She didn't get up. She didn't meow._

"_Care to explain this to me?" The big woman asked in a low, wicked, eerie voice. Zenjin said nothing. _

_His eyes were wide with horror upon seeing the lifeless corpse of his little friend. He said nothing._

"_You KNOW I hate animals...why do you always have to disobey me?" The woman asked._

"_You...killed…her…" Zenjin croaked out weakly._

"_I didn't kill it. It abandoned you. It couldn't stand to be around a cursed piece of trash like you so it left you behind!" The woman shouted in an attempt to justify her actions. She turned around, stomped over to Zenjin, and slapped him so hard she sent him rolling down the stairs._

"_You're a BAD BOY!" She roared as she watched the helpless boy roll down the stairs and fall through a glass panel in a door, shattering it. Shards of glass scattered all around him. The boy found himself unable to get up. He fell to the floor, his eyesight blurring. "Nobody will ever want to be your friend! No one wants to be caught DEAD near a curse like you! You're a disease!" She stomped to the bottom of the stairs and proceeded to shove his face through another glass panel, again shattering it. "Admit it! You're a bad boy! Say it! WORD FOR WORD!"_

"_I'm...a...bad...boy…"_

"_LOUDER YOU TRASH!"_

"_I'M A BAD BOY!"_

(end flashback)

"Hey! There he is!" A voice pulled Zenjin out of his nightmare, forcing him to stand up in alarm. He found himself surrounded by angry native Rozanielans. Some had weapons on them, like swords, katanas, naginatas, nunchucks, bows and arrows, and ninja stars. "You're gonna pay for messing up our home!" One man yelled.

"This is our freaking planet!" Another man screamed.

"You need to confess to your crimes or we'll make you!" A woman screamed before some people charged at him. Zenjin snapped his fingers and disappeared.

"Come back here, you knave!" A woman screeched angrily as she banged her fist on the ground.

* * *

_'How could I have been so foolish?!'_

Beileag ditched her high heels and ran like the wind, completely barefoot. She didn't care if twigs and stones were leaving marks on her bare feet. She felt she deserved this pain after all she had done. She wished she could turn back time. Go back to that moment, and make herself not fall for that bitter, hateful, back-stabbing git Decebal.

_'How could I have fallen for someone like him?!'_

She only wanted to perform by his side. To be with him. To earn his praise. He treated her like an equal back then. She always wanted someone to treat her as an equal, not someone to be pushed away for being different, like the kids at school once did. To think he had been fooling her all this time...Beileag wanted to rip his head off.

_'How did I...get roped into this whole mess?!'_

She wanted to rip his head off. For tricking her. For playing her like a fool. For pretending to love her when he was only using her for his own ends. For not doing a thing when Zenjin would beat her and throw misogynistic insults at her like she was his punching bag. For this whole mess!

Beileag didn't want to destroy the world. She didn't want any of this. All she wanted was to live her dream. To be with the one she loved. She got to live her dream, yes, but being deceived by the one she thought she loved...she wondered if this was why her mother and father roamed around the planet like nomads. To avoid this kind of pain.

Suddenly, her foot got caught on a vine and she fell flat on her face, her heart shaped glasses bouncing on the ground.

She didn't even bother to pull herself up.

Falling for Decebal or her own part in Rozaniela's decimation.

She wasn't sure which was worse.

With a clench of her fist, she scooped up some dirt and threw it at no one in particular. Tears sprung forth from her eyes, and she found herself crying softly.

"Idiot..." Beileag cursed before banging her fist on the dirt with a wail, squashing some strands of fresh grass. "Idiot idiot idiot IDIOOOOT!" Her hat dropped onto the ground as she buried her face in the dirt, letting the tears flow. "I...I deserve to die..."

She wished she could just lie here and starve. Just disappear. Perish. Nobody would know. Beileag couldn't carry this burden. She didn't think she could. All she wanted now was to disappear.

If only she had never fallen for Decebal.

That stupid, hateful, misogynistic, disgusting, evil man!

If anything, he deserved more than she ever did! She would never have done any of this if she hadn't blindly followed him without asking questions! Had she known what he and Zenjin had planned from the very beginning, had she asked questions, had she discovered the truth earlier, she would have ditched them right away! Had she known the truth about Decebal's true feelings for her, or lack thereof, Beileag would have cut him off and washed her hands clean of him!

If only she hadn't been so foolish...

Just like back then.

"Zenjin and Decebal are right...you are stupid..."

_"Teacher! Teacher! Mael's dead! The poor hamster!"_

_"Beileag was the one who fed her last. Maybe she poisoned his food!"_

_"No! I didn't do it!"_

_"Liar! Confess! You're a killer alien!"_

_"You don't care about anyone but yourself! You don't even apologize! You killed him and you don't even admit it!"_

_"I didn't do it, I swear! Ethan's the one who gave me the food!"_

_"You're awful! Don't blame Ethan for something YOU did! Why can't you just admit it, you stupid idiot?!"_

Even at ten years old, Beileag was played for a fool. Beileag wondered if she did something bad to deserve being used like this. Or...was her very existence a liability to the people she interacted with? Would it be better if...she disappeared? It wasn't like anyone she knew cared about her. They only wanted to use her for either their own ends or as a scapegoat so they wouldn't have to admit to their own mistakes or take responsibility.

She wondered if maybe it had been better to just stay with her mother and father, that way if she had roamed around, not staying in one place, she wouldn't have time to develop feelings for someone or even to make friends. Was this the pain her parents wanted to protect her from?

"Mom...Dad..."

As annoying as roaming all over the place was, Beileag loved seeing the new places and all of their attractions. The cities on water. The big, lit up Christmas trees that seemed to glow during the holiday season. The festivals on the streets with elephants and people dancing the flamenco with painted faces, feathered headdresses, the clapping of the castanets, and drumming of the zarbs. Looking up at the beautiful stars at night when they slept outside, alongside the trees, flowers, animals, and fairies. Frolicking through the flower fields and making little flower wreaths, giving some bouquets of flowers to her mother, who always received them warmly and hugged her little daughter, showering her with all her love.

Beileag didn't think she deserved love anymore. Not after all this.

A rumble in her stomach. Her eyes blurred. Before she could process it, she found herself encased in light.

The first thing she heard was a voice.

"Hello?"

As soon as she peeled her eyes open, she was face to face with a scruffy male doctor, with a small mustache. "Oh, good. You're awake."

Her head was throbbing, but she managed to pull herself up. The smell of medicine and fresh cinnamon rolls made her alert and awake. The hospital lights were bright, so she covered her eyes with them in order to make them adjust. But she looked around and saw a lamp on a desk next to her bed. Fluorescent lights above her. Posters on the wall written in Japanese.

_'I'm on Earth? How did I get here? Did I use the spell without knowing it?'_

"We found you outside the hospital unconscious," The doctor explained kindly, pulling out a clipboard.

Beileag stared down at her blankets, clutched them with her hands and grimaced. _'You should have left me there,'_ She thought bitterly. But she knew very well that doctors don't leave patients to die.

The doctor wrote some things down on the clipboard. "Last name?"

"Satrapi."

"First name?"

Although she hated it, she choked it out. "...Beileag."

"You're not from around here, are you?"

Beileag shook her head grimly.

"Where are you from?"

She couldn't tell him about Rozaniela. He was a normal human. He wouldn't believe her if she told him about a planet in another dimension, and even if she did, she wasn't sure if she could handle going back, face-to-face with all the damage she caused. "I...I don't have an address here," That was all she could choke out.

One of the doctor's eyebrows arched up in a confused way. Beileag could tell he was thinking, perhaps assuming she was homeless. Soon, he smiled. "You rest for a while. I have some other patients to check on. If you need me, just give me a holler," With that, he walked away to tend to some other patients.

The smell of cinnamon wafted into her nose, and she turned around to find a tray full of food. Baby carrots, a bowl of chicken noodle soup, some peas, mashed potatoes, two small cinnamon rolls, a cup of milk, and a slice of fresh, buttery yellow cheesecake. Hospital food was normally never this fancy. The rumbling in her stomach amplified. On impulse, she gently took a cinnamon roll into her hand. The sweet aroma was enough to bring back fond memories of when her mother would make cinnamon rolls on Sundays.

Beileag remembered those days well. When her mother wasn't looking, she'd take at least two or three so she could snack on them all by herself, and if her mother caught her, she would be scolded for being so inconsiderate and gluttonous. But their warm, fluffy, sticky taste was enough to send Beileag to Heaven. Now, Beileag couldn't eat the cinnamon roll without thinking of her parents. Tears sprung forth from her eyes again.

If she really could go home, how could she face her parents? Would they disown her if they found out about her involvement in Zenjin's crimes? Beileag assumed they would. Another growl from her stomach. She decided to put down the cinnamon roll and consume the rest of the food. A bad day would only be made worse on an empty stomach, and she was starving, so she decided to eat. But the hollow, empty feeling in her soul wasn't filled. The only thing she didn't eat were the cinnamon rolls.

Then she saw a set of clothes folded on a chair. A simple gray jacket, dark blue jeans, and a bright yellow T-shirt, all neatly folded. A pair of white and red sneakers sat next to the chair. Did the doctor do this? Beileag assumed he did. But why did he care for her so much? Was it because he was a doctor, or was there something else? Later on, Beileag decided to put the clothes on. She looked presentable, and her stomach was filled, but the guilt clung to her like a tapeworm. She noticed that there were a lot of band-aids and bandages on her bare feet.

Once she put everything on, she walked out of the room. She ran into the doctor from before. "Hello again. Have you contacted your family?"

Beileag averted his gaze, staring down at her new sneakers. "I...I don't know where they are," Her eyes trembled sadly. "And even if I did...they don't...deserve such a bad daughter like me..." More tears sprung forth.

With a soft smile, the doctor put a hand on her shoulder. His gaze was kind. Admittedly, Beileag was startled by this gesture. "I don't know what you've been through, but don't lose hope. I'm sure things will get better for someone as beautiful as you."

_'I'm not beautiful. I never have been,'_ Beileag wanted more than anything to accept his compliment. Just hearing it made her feel warm inside. It was what she wanted more than anything. For someone to tell her that she mattered, that she was worth something. But he would certainly take it back if she told him everything. With only a nod and a forced smile, she left the hospital.

A tiny voice told her that she was not beautiful and that a scamp like her didn't deserve such compliments. But she had to admit, she was happy that the doctor cared about her, enough to make that delicious tray of food, buy some clothes for her, and tell her that she was beautiful. Not all people were like Decebal.

However...where could she go now?

Who could she rely on?

How could she deal with this?

Beileag didn't know what to do, so she just ambled through the Hikaribashi neighborhood, lost in her thoughts. Rozaniela's destruction. Her meeting with the Pretty Cure. All the times Zenjin treated her like dirt. All the times Decebal made misogynistic comments about her. Tearing his room to shreds. Malgorzata begging her to reconsider her alignment.

Malgorzata...

Even in light of her betrayal, Malgorzata still believed in Beileag. She proved that when she pleaded with her to reconsider her alignment, that she deserved better than this. Beileag just couldn't understand why someone like her would continue to believe in her, especially in light of what she had done?

"Queen..."

Feeling her legs ache, she sat down on a bench. A small squirrel scurried across a telephone line, with some nuts in its cheeks. She heard the sound of a child giggling across the street. A little girl threw a ball at her mother, while her father just stood there and watched. Beileag found herself smiling sweetly when the mother hoisted her daughter into the air and spun around like a top, with the girl laughing happily.

"Mommy!"

"Chi-chan!"

_'How nice. A family of three...they must be so happy together...'_ Beileag thought, fondly remembering the times she and her parents would play together in various parks and meadows, throwing balls at each other just like that. In her guilt ridden heart, Beileag yearned to return to those happy days, where she didn't know anything about the harsh, cold reality, nor did she feel the pain that people inflicted on her.

A voice in her head told her she didn't deserve happiness. Not even a lick of it...and she agreed with it. She found herself sobbing softly, burying her already wet face into her thin hands. If only she had never gone with Decebal. If only she had never fallen in love with him.

_'I'm a terrible person...'_

"Oh my. What's wrong, miss?"

Beileag looked up to find an old man in front of her, with a concerned look on his face. A scruffy old man he was, with a very shriveled up, wrinkled face, donning a thin but long beard that went down to the bottom of his neck. His head was covered by a dark blue snow hat, he was wearing a crimson red scarf, a large beige jacket, tattered black pants, fingerless black gloves, and soft brown shoes. Beileag could see the concern in his tired eyes.

She wiped the tears from her face. "It's...nothing..."

"It doesn't look like nothing to me. I know a sad face when I see one. If you want to talk about it, I'm more than willing to listen."

The man could see that Beileag's face was splotchy and red from too much crying. Beileag found herself locked in place by the man's kind gaze. How could she refuse him? Why would he want to listen to her angsting about something she knows she can't fix?

Did this world even have room for someone like her in it?

There would be no reset button. The guilt from her actions weighed heavy on her. Telling him about it won't change anything.

But it wasn't like this man was intruding. He wanted to help. The fact that he did said a lot about him. Beileag figured she could at least tell him about it. It wasn't like she was going to see him again anyway. She scooched over to let him sit down next to her. "I have a daughter about your age. She's an aspiring fashion designer."

Immediately, Beileag's eyes sparkled, and she clasped her hands together, framed with a wide smile. "Oh my gosh, I am too! I absolutely love designing dresses and trying stuff on and all that stuff! I just love really flashy stuff, like super colorful shirts, flared jeans, super duper high heels, and colorful hats!"

The old man laughed heartily. "You sound just like my dear Ayako. But she's more into the overly poofy and cutesy sweet lolita dresses and fashion."

"Oh! I know what you mean! They're sooooo cute! I love looking at the dresses and the frills and the designs! Man, the designs they can come up with are incredible!" Beileag's smile faded a bit. "I'd been meaning to try them sometime, but I don't know if I can pull off the super cute look."

The old man smiled. "I don't see any harm in trying. I think you should dress the way you want to in anything you like, even if you can't pull it off. If you like trying on clothes, then that's all that matters, right?"

Beileag stood up from the bench. "You're SO right! In fact..." Beileag found herself gazing at the old man. "I can easily picture you in Western style fashion! Like a cowboy or something! Wearing overalls, cowboy boots, a cowboy hat...you'd look awesome!"

As soon as Beileag said that, she found herself noticing his grimy clothes and fingerless gloves. "Ugh! Sorry! That was insensitive of me!" Beileag found herself slumping down on the bench. _'Really, Beileag?! You're talking about dressing him up when he can't afford to buy his own food?! Ever heard of something called tact?!'_

The man smiled again. "I appreciate the sentiment, dearie, and don't feel bad about expressing yourself. You look like you haven't had the best of days."

Beileag's smile faded. She was surprised by how blurry everything got. Before she could stop herself, she blurted out, "Don't waste your compliments on me. I...I'm a horrible person."

"How so?"

Beileag stared.

And stared some more.

"I...fell in love with someone. I liked him and wanted to work alongside him...and I did for a while. But..." Beileag sniffed and hiccupped. "He never liked me back. He was just using me as an accomplice for his crimes!" Beileag slammed her fists onto the bench. She didn't care if it made her hands hurt. She wanted them to hurt. Anything to amplify the pain of having to carry this guilt. "He and Zenjin...killed people! And I helped him! I'm an accessory to murder!"

Finally, she burst into tears and fell into the old man's chest. The old man held her close and gently stroke her back, letting her cry as much as she wanted. "I never wanted any of this! I just wanted...someone to like me and treat me as an equal! Not an object they can use, trick, and throw away for their convenience! I'm sick of always being fooled! I'm sick of always...being so stupid..."

The old man said nothing. He just continued to listen and stroke her back gently, like he would for his own kids when they would have a bad day at school and wanted a hug. After a while, Beileag's sobs quieted down to snivels and hiccups. "I know...I know nothing I do will ever fix anything...or bring back the people they killed. I...I don't know what to do. I can't go home. Mom and Dad...probably wouldn't want an accessory to murder living in their house, and my employers..." She didn't dare mention the King and Queen. Just thinking about them made her heart sting even more.

"You've been through a lot, haven't you?" The old man whispered kindly.

Poor girl.

Soon, Beileag pulled herself out of his arms and wiped some of her tears away. "Sorry. You don't deserve to put up with my whining, especially since..." She wanted to add that he had less than she did, but she didn't want to come off as insensitive or offending him, so she kept her mouth shut.

"I've...done something similar..."

"Eh?!" Beileag's indigo hair whipped around as soon as she heard that.

"I can't go into details but...I've made some decisions in my life that I'm not proud of. I hurt my family in ways you can't even imagine, even though I never intended for any of it to happen. But contrary to what people think, they didn't kick me out. Instead, I chose to live like this. I don't want my children or their grandchildren to suffer because of me, and I feel they're better off without me," The man explained to her softly, with a sad face.

"But...aren't you sad?" Beileag blurted out. "Don't you...want to see them again and be with them?"

"I do. But what is an old man like me able to do now? I can't go back to my family, because I've caused them too much trouble already. I can never be able to undo what I've done. But...you're still young. I won't ask questions about what you've done, but it won't do you any good to run away from your mistakes. You need to face them head on, and make the effort to rectify them and make it up to the people you hurt before it's too late," The old man explained.

"Easier said than done...but even if I do try...they'll probably just claim that I don't feel bad about it, or that I don't care about anyone but myself or the people I hurt," Beileag whimpered.

"There are many people like that, miss. But do it anyway. Some people will be happy just with you acknowledging that you were in the wrong. That's a step forward. Take that first step and keep moving forward, even if you don't think you deserve forgiveness," The old man told her calmly. "You have your whole life ahead of you, miss. The fact that you told me all of this shows that you have courage."

The man saw memories of himself reading Moomin books to his young trio of children, who gobbled up his storytelling like it was candy. Just the thought of those sweet, peaceful memories painted a smile on his world weary face.

Beileag found herself deep in thought. This old man showered her with so much kindness, much more so than she ever felt she deserved. But he was right. She couldn't run away. She was strong enough to find out the truth. She was strong enough to be straight with Zenjin and tell him that he was not going to put up with his treachery anymore.

It wouldn't be fair to keep running away. To keep her parents and the Queen worrying.

She stood up.

"Thank you for listening to me, mister...uhh..."

"Takayuki. What's your name, dear?"

"I...it's Beileag, but I prefer Billie. I don't really like my real name."

"I think it's a beautiful name. Both names. Did you know that Beileag is a Scottish corruption of the name Isabel?"

Beileag smiled. When he put it that way, he had a point. When Beileag was younger, she wished her parents had named her something pretty, like Isabel, Cordelia, Geraldine, Diana, or Françoise. But Beileag is related to Isabel? That made Beileag's heart relax a bit. "Thank you. For everything. Oh! Here's a little something," Beileag rummaged through her pockets, pulled out some money, and handed it to Takayuki. At least a thousand dollars. She had some money in her old jeans and put some in her pockets before she left the fortress in case of an emergency. "You've been so good to me. You deserve a little something for yourself. And...I think it isn't fair that you give me advice, but don't apply it to yourself."

With a confused look, Takayuki took the money. "I think...you should at least talk to your family. Re-establish contact with them. Maybe they don't hate you anymore. Take a chance. Don't be afraid. Things will look up for you. Can you...do that for me?"

Takayuki said nothing, but he did nod gratefully. "Thank you."

With a grateful bow, Beileag stormed off.

With a strong resolve in her heart, she ran to an empty alleyway and teleported herself to Rozaniela. She needed to confront her mistakes. Be honest. For her own sake, Takayuki's sake, and everyone else on Rozaniela.

Her stomach twisted with every step toward the palace. There was no turning back.

* * *

"King Ghislain!"

"Yes, Jervis?"

"There's someone on the first floor requesting an audience with you."

King Ghislain adjusted his crown and stood up from his desk. "Who is it?"

Jervis dug into his heels. "It's...a woman with purple hair."

Purple hair? Only one person he knew had purple hair. Could it be her...? "Send her inside."

"Yes, sir!" Jervis dashed out of the room. It took a couple minutes for them to arrive, but Jervis returned to the room, accompanied by a purple haired girl wearing heart shaped glasses. She wasn't in her hippie clothes, but Ghislain was quick to recognize her.

"Billie..." He glanced at Jervis. "Thank you, Jervis. Return to your duties."

"Yes, sir," With that, Jervis left the room, leaving Beileag and Ghislain all alone.

At first, the air around them was awkward. Both of them found it hard to speak. Beileag managed to choke some words out. "Umm...can I...talk to you?"

"Sure, dear. Have a seat," Ghislain's voice didn't sound angry like she expected. But rather, pained and in disbelief.

Beileag sat down on a chair. Ghislain did the same. The air around them was even more tense than ever before, but Beileag knew she couldn't lie to him. There was no turning back now. "I...I'm so sorry...for everything I've done...with Decebal and Zenjin...and with everything else..."

Beileag wasted no time telling him about some of her own crimes, Decebal's betrayal and some of his plans, her abandoning Zenjin, and her own agony over what she should do. All Ghislain did was listen, just like Takayuki did. He didn't interrupt or correct her or anything. Once she finished, he had one thing to say. "Have you...learned of what Decebal and Zenjin plan to do with the Energia?"

The purple haired girl nodded. "I don't know all the details, but Zenjin said he wanted to get back at the woman who abused him, probably for everything she did to him. Decebal's just helping him out, and...I went to look for information as well."

Beileag brushed her hands through her hair with a sob. "I...I came because I wanted to tell you and the queen how sorry I am...and-and-and oh God I'm so sorry you must hate me and...I'm willing to accept whatever punishment you unleash upon me!"

A chair scraped against the floor. Beileag didn't dare look up. She saw a hand get raised. She squeezed her eyes shut, awaiting the slap.

But instead of a slap, she found herself getting pulled into his chest. "Thank you...for being honest with me, Billie."

"What?! But...but...but...you should be mad at me! This is the part where you're supposed to yell at me and hit me and tell me I'm not worthy of forgiveness and that I should-"

"No, Billie. How could I hate you, knowing that you were courageous enough to come forward about this and admit to your mistakes? The fact that you...did this at all shows how remorseful you are," Ghislain kept a kind gaze fixated on her. "I think you've punished yourself enough."

More tears sprung forth from Beileag's eyes. "I...I don't know what to say. But the Queen...she must hate me, especially since...she's been so kind to me and I repaid her by...siding with a man who isn't even worth it!"

"I think Malgorzata will understand."

"Is there...?"

"Hm?"

"Is there...anything I can do? To...at least make it up to those I've hurt? I know...it won't change anything, but...I don't...want to run away..." Beileag's voice was growing dry.

"Just be the Billie we know and love. That's all we ask," Ghislain said.

Beileag used her arm to wipe some tears away. "I'll...go see the Pretty Cure. They deserve some apology, too," She got up to leave.

"Billie...no matter what happens, you'll always have a home here," Ghislain told her.

Beileag said nothing and left the room. But as soon as she found herself outside, she fell to her knees and bawled.

_'King Ghislain...thank you...thank you...'_

* * *

"Uuuuugh! I don't even know their home addresses!"

Beileag found herself on Earth, in front of Luminous Library, one of the many libraries in Hikaribashi. This was the biggest and the most well known. She went in here thinking she could get some information, but she realized too late that libraries aren't the best places to search for directions or get people's addresses.

"What do I do now?"

On impulse, she decided to mosey around and find something to read. Maybe taking her mind off it would help her clear out some of those cobwebs lingering around in her mind. She found herself in the kids section of all places. Why did she come here? She wasn't sure. She saw one book lying on the ground, like someone had dropped it. Beileag groaned. One would think people would have the decency to put books away after they were done with them, especially if said books didn't belong to them.

The book in question was Comet In Moominland. Again on impulse, Beileag picked it up, sat down on the floor, and found herself reading through it. And after that the second book. Third, forth, and fifth. She didn't think she'd like it, but she found herself immersed in the characters and their adventures, as a lot of them resembled those she had during her own life. Wandering through creepy forests, exploring dark caves for treasure, flying on magic clouds, etc. After a while, she put them all back.

She found herself moseying into the manga section, surprisingly enough. One title happened to stick out: Hinata Sun Child. She pulled out a copy of volume one and found herself immersed by the cover illustration depicting a young girl with a wand in her hand, accompanied by some magic animals such as an alicorn and some plushy mochi fairies. She sat down and read it. And another volume. And two more.

"It's over here, Moonbeam."

Unbeknownst to Beileag, Riko and Moonbeam happened to come into the manga section right then and there. They both stopped upon seeing the indigo haired woman sitting on a little stool, reading the book intensely. "Is that Beileag-san? What's she doing here?" Moonbeam asked.

"I didn't recognize her. She looks so different when she's not wearing her hippie clothes," Riko whispered.

"Why would she be in a library of all places?" Moonbeam asked.

But when Riko looked closer, her eyes sparkled as soon as she saw the book Beileag was reading: Hinata Sun Child volume four. _'She's reading Hinata Sun Child?! I...I...I know she's our enemy, but...nnnnngh!' _Riko couldn't resist.

Anyone who liked Hinata Sun Child was worth talking to.

"Wha-?! Riko?!"

"Is that Hinata Sun Child?"

Beileag jumped with surprised upon hearing that voice, even more so when she realized it was Riko from whom the voice came from. She almost dropped the book, but she managed to catch it before it could fall. But instead of seeing Riko angry or confused, the girl's eyes were sparkling with delight. "Uh...yes. It is."

"I LOVE Hinata Sun Child! What do you like about it so far? Who's your favorite character? What's your favorite chapter?"

Beileag was overwhelmed by not just the questions, but the fact that not once had Riko brought up Zenjin, Rozaniela, or the Corrupt Sentinels like she expected her to. But she had to admit...she liked this manga. It wouldn't hurt to talk about it with a fellow enthusiastic fan, right? "I...I only just started but...I really like how simple the art is."

"I do it! It knows when to be sparkly and when to be simple, and I like that! My favorite character is Hinata! She and I share a lot of the same struggles, interests, and personalities!"

"I...I like that she's sick of constantly being put down by people who don't understand her."

"Me too! She's strong, too! She doesn't give up, even when it seems impossible! I also like Touki, too! He's always nice to her, and in a way he reminds me of my best friend!"

"Ooh! Now you're talking! Touki's so sweet! He's like a prince, but so much more!"

"I know, right? Plus he and Hinata fight together and he isn't mean to her."

"Rochelle's cute, too. She's so supportive and kind."

"I agree! Have you gotten to the part where they stay at the clairvoyant's cabin and learn about her dead daughter? I love that chapter! It made me cry!"

"No, not yet. But it sounds sad."

Moonbeam's expression was that of disbelief. Riko and Beileag? Enemies? Enthusiastically talking to each other about a manga? She wasn't sure if she recognized them anymore. But she noticed that the two looked quite radiant as they talked, happier than they had ever seen them.

Even Beileag was surprised at how happy she became, but she was so wrapped up in the conversation that she didn't have time to voice her quandary. "I don't really like Amber, though. She's an annoying little brat."

"I agree. I used to hate her, too. She was always whining and being annoying and making everything all about her and not caring about anyone but herself. But she gets better in volume five. Don't worry!"

This was where Beileag decided to stop talking about the manga. "Umm..."

Riko beat her to the punch. "Exactly what are you doing in a library anyway? You don't look like the reading type."

The tense atmosphere returned. "Can we...talk outside? I promise I won't do anything bad."

Riko didn't believe her, but she and Moonbeam went outside with her so as to not disturb the guests. Once they got outside, Beileag spoke first. "Umm...I know this is awkward, but...I'm not here to cause trouble. Listen...you have every right to hate me for everything I've done. I...I deserve all the punishment in the world. I..." Riko looked away upon hearing the older woman's voice tremble. "I...I just...want to tell you and the others how sorry I am for everything that happened, to both Rozaniela and you...and for being such a colossal moron."

Riko and Moonbeam said nothing.

"I've...been a terrible person. I know."

"Can I ask you one thing?" Riko asked curiously.

Beileag nodded.

"Why...did you even go with them?"

Beileag wiped a tear out of her eye. "All I wanted...was to be with Decebal. Had I known he was going to do all of this...I would have ditched him long ago. But I was a fool, and...he used me like a puppet. I know. People died because of my stupidity and inaction. I wish-"

"Hey, Riko!"

That was Kyoya's voice. Riko looked down to find the whole gang approaching them, fairies included. "We're just about to-"

"Hey!" Marina was the first to leap in between Riko and Beileag, throwing a fierce glare at the purple haired woman before pulling out her Heart Lighter. "You lay a hand on Riko and I'll send you to the burn unit!" Sunbeam and Lovebeam floated by her side, with equally fierce glares.

"Yeah! Stay away!"

"Don't you dare turn Riko-chan into a Corrupt Sentinel!"

Riko found herself flabbergasted. "Wait a minute!"

"Pretty Cure, let the light-"

"WAIT!" Riko grabbed Marina's Heart Lighter and hoisted it out of her hand.

"Riko?! What are you doing?!"

"She's not here to cause trouble," Riko told her.

Marina put both hands on Riko's shoulders. "Why else would she be here?! She didn't hurt you, did she?"

Riko shook her head and gently pushed Marina's hands off her shoulders. Everyone else arrived at the scene, with Kyoya using the wheelchair ramp to get there. "Riko. What's going on here?" Hotaru asked.

"I found Beileag-san in the library. She says she wants to apologize for everything," Riko explained.

"You sure have some nerve showing up here!" Marina hissed. "After what you, Zenjin, and the green haired misogynist did!"

"I know, and I'm sorry-"

"No you're not! This is some kind of trick, isn't it?! Well, we're not falling for it, buster!" Marina yelled, causing Riko to cover her ears. "Face it! You don't care about anyone but yourself! Do you even care that millions of people on both planets died or are hurt because of Zenjin?!"

"I NEVER WANTED ANY OF THIS TO HAPPEN!"

Marina glared at her, freezing her in place. "If you really didn't want any of this to happen, you would have stopped them from doing all of this! You would have done something about it! You could have told the King or Queen about it so they could stop them! Did you do all that?! No! You must have sat around putting on make up and reading shampoo bottles you always do!"

"Mari. Don't put words in her mouth," Starbeam told her, but Marina ignored her.

"You're lucky I'm not sending you to the burn unit right now, because believe me! I want to!" Marina hissed.

"Stop it, Mari. Let's listen to her side, too," Hotaru said.

"Don't tell me you're gonna take her side!" Marina yelled.

"Keep it down! You're scaring Riko!" Anzu exclaimed.

Kyoya glared at Beileag, but said nothing. Riko couldn't help but wonder why. He was like Marina in some ways: if someone crossed him, he made it very clear that he didn't like them and would never associate with them again.

Every insult was like a knife to Beileag's heart. Even though she knew some of them would react this way, they still hurt. But she didn't dare contradict Marina. She was right. She made good points. Her own inaction allowed Decebal and Zenjin to do what they wished, and because she still followed them, many were hurt. Even the Pretty Cure.

"...You're right," Beileag's voice trembled again. "I should have done something. Told someone. Even...dealt with them myself. I...I wish I could turn back time...and stop all of this. If I could do that, I would!"

"Yeah! You _should_ have done something, you brainless twit!" Marina hissed.

"Mari! Enough!" Hotaru exclaimed, annoyed by Marina's persistent obstinacy. "Can't you see she's shaking?"

"I don't care if she's on her knees and bawling her eyes out! Saying sorry isn't going to magically fix everything! She's just like Decebal and Zenjin! She's evil and we all know she's gonna stay that way!"

"You don't know that!"

"Can't we all just calm down a bit?" Anzu asked.

Suddenly, Beileag found herself running away, unable to take it anymore. "Beileag-san!" Riko cried. She wanted to go after her, but she wasn't sure if she should or not.

"Just leave her! There's no way she's even the least bit guilty about any of this! For all we know she could be plotting to kill us!" Marina hissed.

But after that, Hotaru ran after her. "Huh?! Hey! Hotaru! Get back here!" Marina shouted.

"Let her go," Kyoya said. "Let them talk. We need to think about this."

"You don't seriously believe that load of garbage, do you?!" Marina shouted with a look of disbelief.

"No. But...what if maybe she is trying to turn over a new leaf?" Kyoya asked.

"Yeah. All those other girl characters in anime were evil and later decided to join the heroes," Riko explained.

"What happens in anime doesn't happen in real life, Riko! God, I hate it when you do this! Don't you ever think about anything BESIDES anime?! Get a reality check, will y-" Marina was about to yell some more, but Anzu slapped a hand on her mouth.

"I didn't sense any evil in her heart," Moonbeam said.

"Come on! She's gotta be lying!" Sunbeam agreed with Marina.

"Yeah! What if she turned Riko into a Corrupt Sentinel?" Lovebeam piped in.

"If she wanted to do that, she'd have done it a lot earlier," Moonbeam clarified. "If she really wanted to attack us, she'd have done it by now."

* * *

"Beileag-san?" Hotaru found Beileag leaning against a small tree a couple blocks away from the library. "Can I join you?"

Hesitantly, Beileag nodded. Hotaru stood next to her, leaning against the tree, with the gentle breeze catching their hair. "She's right, y'know. I can never take back what I've done. You all have...every right to hate me and be mad."

"I don't hate you."

"You don't?"

Hotaru shook her head kindly. "The fact that you acknowledge what you've done is a step forward. I admire your courage."

"I'm not courageous at all. I'm a big fat coward, just like your friend says."

"I don't know if...everyone else will be ready to forgive you yet. I'm sure they're all conflicted. But..." Hotaru slipped her hand into Beileag's. "I forgive you.

"You...do?"

Hotaru nodded, with a warm, kind smile to match.

More tears sprung forth. "Thank you...I...I...I don't know what to say...if there's anything I can do to make it up to you and everyone I've hurt, I-"

Hotaru shook her head. "Just...don't get involved with Zenjin or Decebal ever again."

"Right. I'm so over them. Decebal's such a hard-headed, misogynistic fool!"

"I agree."

For the first time in a very long while, Beileag felt light as a feather. She wasn't sure if she deserved any of this kindness. All of this was too much to take in. But for what it was worth, it was enough.


	29. Helping a Friend Is Great!

Chapter 27: Helping a Friend is a Great Thing!

On Sunday, Riko began her morning by watching some Jewelpet with Moonbeam before returning to studying for the make-up math test this Wednesday. The good thing about this was that Riko stayed after school with Mr. Ikari last Thursday, before the showdown with Zenjin, and he managed to explain everything to her in ways she managed to understand. But Riko still wasn't sure if she'll be able to pass the make-up test.

Moonbeam had to admit, she liked that Riko takes her schoolwork so seriously. There had never been a day where she hadn't worked on her homework. As far as she knew, she always started on her homework after dinner, always turned it in on time, always found time to study whatever it was they were learning, and always did her very best. Moonbeam saw the graded papers Riko would bring back. A's and B's on nearly everything, with a few C's peppering around. Other than the 69 on the math test, Riko always did great in school. There were times when she'd ask Arinao and Saki for help on the homework, but they didn't learn some of this stuff when they were young, and even if they did manage to help, they didn't solve the problems the way they were supposed to, which wasn't their fault, really.

"You really take studying seriously, don't you?" Moonbeam asked innocently as she read one of Riko's volumes of _Shine The Light: Loving An Autistic Child_.

"I do. I don't like it, but I have to go to school and do well in it," Riko replied, continuing to pour over the study sheets. She lay on her bed quietly, with her cat Reese lying next to her contentedly, purring away. Little Reese always liked cuddling with her favorite friend, snuggling up to her, which, to Riko, was the best kind of moral support. Riko stroke Reese's warm fur-her fur was always warm and fuzzy, just the way Riko liked it-as she poured over the equations, hoping they'll stay in her head this time. Moonbeam flashed a smile, happy that Riko cared so much about her schoolwork. She just wished Riko would have some more confidence in herself. "If I fail the make-up test, I'm gonna cry!"

"I think you'll do just fine. You've been studying a lot, and Ikari-sensei and Kyo-chan explained everything to you better, so I think you'll pass. I was never good at math either, so I know how you feel," Moonbeam told her reassuringly, hoping this'll boost Riko's already low confidence just a little bit.

With a great yawn, Reese stretched her front legs out, revealing her long, sharp claws. She made sure to avoid Riko's clothes so she wouldn't get scratched, and Riko doesn't like it when her cats dig their claws into her clothes, which in turn dig into her skin. It hurts! "Hey, Riko-chan? I have a question."

"What is it?"

"I don't mean to sound rude when I ask this, but...I hear that you're autistic. Is that true?"

Riko knew Moonbeam wasn't asking to be rude or mean, so she just simply answered, "Yes. There's still a lot I don't understand about it though."

"Have you told Mari-chan or Anzu-chan about it yet?"

It was here that Riko put her study sheet down and stroke Reese's fur a little bit. "I want to...but how can I explain it to them when...I don't even know much about it myself? And if I do, what if they get the wrong idea and decide they don't want to be my friend anymore? It's bad enough Mari-chan gets mad whenever I do anything and accuses me of messing stuff up during our battles when I don't mean to."

"I don't think they're the kind of people that'll stop being friends with you just over one thing," Moonbeam piped in. "I know about it and we're still friends. Kyo-chan and Sunbeam, too," The bad memories Moonbeam saw in Riko's inner world flashed through her mind. She didn't want to think about those, so she tried to push them to the wayside. "Besides, I don't think you need to go into real techy explanations about it if you do tell them. You can just tell them about stuff like your sensitivity to loud noise, like rap music or yelling or rock concerts or that spicy food burns your mouth."

"Yeah, but what if they don't believe me? And if they do, what if they just tell me to get over it or think I'm being a big baby or a drama queen, like Rina does?"

Moonbeam facepalmed. She heard that Riko thinks too much, but now she saw that it was true. But then again, who could blame her after everything she had been through? "I don't think they're like that. They're your friends. You should believe in them. Everybody's different, and we should all be proud of that. That goes for you, too. You shouldn't care so much about what other people think, and if they can't love you for who you really are, then they're not worth it. That's what my mother always says."

Riko smiled before going back to her study sheet. Moonbeam had a good point. Not only that, Riko knows that she, Kyoya, and Sunbeam saw her memories and were inside her inner world, saving her from falling into despair, exacerbated by Zenjin putting that spell on her. That pretty much told her all she needed to know about how much they care about her. Then she remembered her Light Bringer getting corrupted. "Umm...Moonbeam? I'm sorry about going crazy during our battle yesterday. I didn't mean to."

"I know," Moonbeam told her with a sweet smile. "You were worried about Kyo-chan and wanted to save him. That's natural, and I know how much you care about him." Moonbeam knew just how much Riko cared about the first friend she ever made. The fact that she'd put her life on the line for him said a lot about her character. But even Moonbeam knew there are both pros and cons to that kind of attitude. "Just...try to be a little more careful next time. The Light Bringers amplify all emotions, good and bad. I just don't want you to have negative feelings and wind up going crazy to the point where bad things happen. People'll get angry at you or think you're a bad person, which I know you're not."

Riko smiled and stroke Moonbeam's ear. "Thanks."

"Riko! Dinner's ready!" Saki called out from downstairs.

"Okay!" Riko answered back. Moonbeam noticed that Riko still had her study sheet in her hand.

"Are you taking that with you?"

"Yep! I'll bring some for you, okay?"

Moonbeam didn't bother questioning it. She didn't mind. It just showed how devoted Riko was to her studies.

The Tasogare family sat all around the table, eating rice, tonkatsu, and lettuce. Rina couldn't help but be unsettled by the fact that even as she was eating, Riko still stared at her study sheet. Did she really have to bring it down here? "Hey, Riko. Put that paper away. It's not going anywhere."

Riko said nothing. "Calm down, Rina," Saki told her. "She's not bothering anybody. Eat your food."

Without another word, Rina ate the rest of her tonkatsu. But she wished she didn't have to eat lettuce. Ugh! So crunchy and icky. But still, the fact that Riko just kept on staring at that paper was enough to make her really irritated. She just didn't see why she needed to keep staring at it all throughout dinner. But she didn't want to make anyone angry, so she kept quiet.

Riko finished her dinner, secretly grabbed some leftovers for Moonbeam, and stormed back into her room. Moonbeam happily received the tonkatsu and lettuce. Lettuce is a good source of fiber, as her mother always said. "I really hope I pass the make-up test," Riko mused, shaking her hands a little.

"You will. Just take your time, don't rush it, do the best you can, and if there's a problem you can't solve right away just skip it and come back to it when you're done with the rest of them," Moonbeam told her reassuringly.

Riko didn't find her words to be of any consolation, but she didn't want to seem ungrateful, so she just smiled and went back to her study sheet.

* * *

Finally, the day of the make-up test arrived. Riko was so dead set on passing it that she didn't go out during recess to hang out with her friends. She just stayed in the classroom with Mrs. Omori until the bell rang, staring over that paper like it was a clue to finding a hidden treasure. Even Mrs. Omori couldn't help but admire Riko's determination. She never met a student who skipped recess before. Soon, when the final bell rang, Riko stayed after school with Mr. Ikari to take the make-up test.

It must be confessed that Riko's insides were doing constant back-flips, and her hands trembled with every stroke of her purple mechanical pencil. Riko even wanted to cry, but she knew she needed to focus. She just glued her eyes to the paper and solved whatever problems she could. She hoped to God that her studying would pay off. She just couldn't fail again. Keep calm. Stay focused. Do your best. That's all everyone expects. Riko could feel her wrist throbbing a little, but she didn't want to pay any attention to it. Finally, after at least an hour, the make-up test was finally complete. She ambled over to Mr. Ikari and handed the paper to him without a word.

When she left the classroom, she let out a huge sigh of relief, happy to have finally finished it. It was as though a giant pile of bricks had been lifted off of her. But doubts were still swimming in her heart like hungry sharks. What if she failed? What if she got an even worse grade than before? What if she didn't improve at all? Riko didn't want to think about failing that test.

"Hey! Riko!"

Riko turned around. She knew that voice anywhere. "Hi, Kyo-chan."

There he was, slumped on his wheelchair like he had just finished running a marathon. But he was still alert enough to notice Riko's hands shaking. "I take it the test was pretty hard, huh?"

"Yep. I'm just glad I'm done. But I really hope I don't fail!" Riko exclaimed.

"I'm sure you won't."

"What are you doing here, Kyo-chan?"

"Take a wild guess," Kyoya said.

Riko looked up and noticed they were right in front of the nurse's office. She saw a set of parallel bars. "Oh. Right. Physical therapy," But she also noticed Fukiko in there, talking with the nurse. Riko found herself smiling. Fukiko was following through on her wish to patch things up with Kyoya.

"You on your way home now?" Kyoya asked.

"Yeah. My parents are probably outside. I don't wanna keep them waiting," Riko replied.

"I get you. I'm gonna bail, too," Kyoya said before his expression turned solemn, and the cheerfulness in his voice disappeared. "Can I...ask you something?"

"Sure."

"When you were...under Zenjin's spell...what did you see? I mean..." Riko could tell Kyoya's voice was wavering a little bit. "What happened to you?"

Riko looked away from him at that moment. "I saw..." She clutched one of her arms. "...a teacher from one of my old schools. She wasn't very nice."

Kyoya could tell she looked a little perturbed, and immediately regreted asking. "Sorry! It's probably something personal. Sorry I asked!"

"No no. It's okay. Can I tell you about it tomorrow? It's kind of a long story," Riko told him.

"Sure. But if you don't want to talk about it, that's fine. I totally understand if it's too personal."

Riko shook her head. "Actually, I've been wanting to tell a friend this for a long time. But I'll tell you and the others about it tomorrow, okay? Bye!" With that, she ran out of the school. Kyoya did the same.

What they didn't know was that a girl a little older than them was walking down the hall with a smile on her face. She had black hair like Riko's, but it went down to her chin, curling at the ends, framing a set of blue green eyes that sparkled like a pond in the woods on a clear spring day. She was wearing a heavy green jacket, a long brown skirt, gray socks, white and purple sneakers, and a silver ring shaped like a fish on her index finger. On her back was a tattered pink book bag with lots of hearts all over it.

"Umi-chan!"

Umi turned around, spotting a woman in her late thirties with curling brown hair and blue eyes right behind her. "Serizawa-sensei. Hi."

"Hello, Umi-chan. Do you have a minute or two?"

"Uh...sure," Umi followed Mrs. Serizawa into an empty classroom. Umi liked Mrs. Serizawa. She always made math fun, and came up with neat ideas to help the kids memorize the lessons. There was one time in fifth grade when she came up with a game where she assigned everyone a number, and when she said four times twelve or six times three, the person with the assigned number had to shout, "Here!" Umi was given the number seventy-two back then.

"What is it?" Umi asked curiously.

Mrs. Serizawa sat down in a desk in front of Umi, folded her hands together, and smiled warmly. "You've been doing very well in your classes, Umi-chan. There's never been a day where I haven't heard the teachers talk about you glowingly," Mrs. Serizawa told her.

Umi looked away and blushed. "It's no big deal. I only do good because my friends help me."

"Kuromochi-sensei says you always come to his after school sessions every day, and after that Late Study," Mrs. Serizawa continued. "You always stay right until school closes," Her face turned a little but solemn, but still had that softness about it that Umi always liked. But Umi could tell she was serious right now, but not in a mean way. "I admire your dedication to your schoolwork, but...is there any reason you always stay so late? I don't mean to pry, but that kind of dedication is also rather concerning. I've...heard about what happened to your parents, and that your home situation is rather...difficult."

Umi knew what she was getting at. Her face burned at the mention of it. She never did like being reminded of her current poverty, and never talked about it. But Mrs. Serizawa was nice, and it wasn't like she was trying to be mean or intrusive. She just wanted to help. She always helped the students whenever they needed her. Umi shrugged. She might as well tell her.

"My sister and I...we live in the Sunshine Shelter. I don't really like it over there, and neither does she. Some people have stolen some of our stuff, and it's always crowded in there," Umi began sheepishly. "My sister can't seem to hold down a job no matter how hard she tries. Sometimes when I come home, she gets mad and stays that way the whole day. But lately it's been happening more and more. I know she works hard, and I want to make her happy. But...I wish there was more I could do for her."

Mrs. Serizawa listened carefully, and didn't interrupt when Umi told her about her current home life. Soon, a smile appeared on her face. "Are you good with kids and pets?"

Umi looked up, finding herself confused by the sudden question. But she answered as honestly as she could. "I do like playing with little kids, and I used to have some fish. I do love cats and dogs, too."

"I have two little girls and a dog. My husband works during the day, and sometimes I have to stay after school, so I can't be there to pick my kids up from school. I was wondering...would you be interested in babysitting them?"

"Eh?!" Umi's eyes widened and she found herself aghast. "Babysitting?"

"Yes. I see how well you get along with your friends. I think a little job like this would be good for you. Would you like to try it? My kids would love to play with you," Mrs. Serizawa exclaimed.

Already, new thoughts were swimming in Umi's head like a circle of sharks. A job! A real job! She could make her own money just from watching someone's kids! She lost control and leaped onto Mrs. Serizawa, almost knocking her over. "I'm so so so so happy! Thank you thank you thank you, Serizawa-sensei! Oh!" As soon as she realized she just hugged her teacher, she immediately let go. She was glad Sorane didn't see that. "Sorry!"

"It's okay, dear."

"Oh! That's right! I do need to ask Sorane, though. If she says yes, I'll let you know first thing tomorrow."

"Take all the time you need, dear."

"But...why would you want to do this for me? We're just a teacher and a student."

"You're a great student, and I think you deserve a little something nice for your efforts. I know things have been difficult for you, and I want to help in some way."

"I should probably get going. Sorane will get mad if I don't get back before dinner. But again! First thing tomorrow!"

"You take care, Umi-chan. Be careful. It's dark out," Mrs. Serizawa advised.

Umi ran out of the classroom so fast she almost slipped on the floor. But she managed to catch herself and storm out of the school. It didn't take her long to get back to the Sunshine Shelter. But when she got there, she saw Sorane lying in bed. This time, however, she didn't have an irritated look on her face. "Hi, Sorane!"

"Hi, Umi. How was school," Sorane asked.

"Great! You'll never believe this!" Umi exclaimed cheerfully, her face and eyes radiant like sunshine. Even Sorane was a bit put off by her exuberance. "Serizawa-sensei's offering me a job!"

Sorane looked at her like she just confessed that she was secretly a green haired alien from Mars. "You can't be serious."

"I am! She wanted to ask if I could babysit her kids! I kind of want to ask you about it first," Umi explained. "Please? Please? Please?" She folded both hands together so tight the tips of her fingers turned snow white. "Can I babysit her kids? Pleeeeeease? I really want to do it! It'll be my first job and I can make real money!"

For once, Sorane was actually happy for Umi. She smiled and stroke her messy black hair. "Alright alright. You can babysit her kids. Just let me know the days and times she makes you stay at her house, okay?"

Again, Umi couldn't contain herself. "Yaaaaay!" Again, she leaped on her sister and trapped her in a tight bear hug. "Thank you thank you thank you! This'll be great! I can help you make money! It'll be just perfect!"

"Yeah...I'm happy that you're happy, Umi, but...you're kind of blocking my airway," Sorane choked.

"Oh! Sorry again!"

"And keep your voice down."

Umi rubbed her hands through her messy black hair with a rueful laugh. "Hehehe," But she couldn't wait for tomorrow.

Wait a minute. Tomorrow...

_'Sorane's 19th birthday is tomorrow! What do I doooooo?!'_ Once again, Umi was lost in her mind. Sorane went back to looking through the want-ads in a newspaper she was reading. She circled some potential jobs with an old black pen. She was surprised it still worked. She wished she could land a permanent job. Well, not permanent, but at least enough to support herself and Umi for the time being.

* * *

"I DID IIIIIIT!" Riko stormed down the rusty steel bleachers so fast she almost ran into her friends. Anzu, Kyoya, Fukiko, Chinami, and Marina all turned around as soon as they heard Riko's loud voice. She managed to stop herself from running into her friends, but she waved a paper around like she won the lottery.

It was her make-up test. Up in the top right hand corner was a big number 98 written in blue pen. "I passed! I passed!" Riko was so excited she was jumping up and down, flapping her hands to the same rhythm, unable to contain her overflowing joy.

"Wow! That's great, Riko!" Anzu exclaimed with a smile before trapping Riko in a tight hug.

"Told you you'd pass! And you thought you'd fail!" Kyoya cheered, giving her a pat on the back.

"I passed, too! See?" Fukiko showed Riko her own graded paper. It had an 87 on it in the same blue pen.

"Me three!" Chinami showed everyone her paper. It had a 91 on it in the top right hand corner. "Guess we all passed the make-up test, huh?"

"Good job, everybody," Marina flashed a bright smile at everyone. "Who's up for a party at my place tomorrow?"

"That'll be perfect, since it's Friday and all!" Chinami exclaimed.

"I'll ask my parents," Fukiko said.

"Oh, shut up over there!" Yoshie sneered from a couple feet away. "Nobody cares that you losers passed a stupid math test! Anybody can pass it! Don't act like you're sooooo much better than everybody else!"

Toshiko gave her a suspicious look. "Oh really? If anybody can pass it, then why did you get an 18? That's a big fat F!" She deadpanned.

Yoshie's face burned, turning red with embarrassment before she tried to swat Toshiko with one of her hands. Toshiko managed to evade it just in time. "You're supposed to agree with me, you twit!"

"Please don't fight! You'll get in trouble!" Shizuka exclaimed, trying to get in between the girls to no avail.

Riko's group didn't even hear them, as they were too lost in their own chatter to really notice them. But did Toshiko really have to flaunt Yoshie's bad grade in front of Shizuka? That's not what friends do. It was bad enough Yoshie failed. If her dad found out about this, he'd ground her for eternity!

Later, Chinami and Fukiko broke away from the group to talk to some of their friends. Riko and the others didn't mind. But Riko sat down with everyone and told them about what she saw when she was under Zenjin's spell, and some things about herself and the experiences she had at Kashino. With every word she spoke, she felt as though a heavy burden had been lifted off of her. Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina listened carefully, and didn't interrupt when she told them everything.

"Ouch. I oughta meet this teacher someday so I can punch her in the face. Nobody messes with you," Marina exclaimed, cracking her knuckles.

"I never knew you went through that," Anzu said. "I wish you lived where I lived, that way we could have been friends long before all this."

"That'd be great," Riko replied sweetly.

Kyoya put a hand on her shoulder. "Well, you're far away from them now, so they can't hurt you anymore. If anyone messes with you, they deal with us!" He balled one of his fists and raised it in front of his face with a triumphant smile on his face.

For a moment, Riko felt like she was going to cry from too much happiness. She had always dreamed of talking to friends about her problems, but nobody wanted to be her friend, let alone listen to someone who they thought was a weird, whiny crybaby. Before she moved to Hikarbashi, Riko wanted to die from too much sadness. But now, she wouldn't want to trade places with an angel. For now, she just wished this moment would go on forever.

"Okay okay! Enough with the mushy angsty stuff! Let's get down to business! What was Beileag's deal the other day?" Marina asked, adopting a serious tone of voice this time around. "First she and her lackeys try to kill us and now she wants to join our side?" Marina put her hands on her hips. "It's a trick. No doubt about it."

"I don't know. She seemed pretty serious," Anzu piped in.

"I asked her why she went with them in the first place, and she said all she wanted was to be with Decebal. She probably doesn't like him anymore," Riko explained.

"She could be lying!" Marina exclaimed. "We all know that's what she and her lackeys are like!" The kids could tell getting through to Marina wasn't going to be an easy task, with how vehemently she's against the idea of Beileag ditching Zenjin and Decebal.

"I can see where you're coming from, but if Beileag really was still on Zenjin's side, she would have hurt Riko when they were in the library," Kyoya said.

"She could have just been waiting for a chance to make her let her guard down and THEN attack her! What if we hadn't been there?!" Marina argued, flapping her arms up and down. "Have you forgotten the time she turned Hotaru into a giant firefly?! Or the time she ruined the entire aquarium and turned Daizo into a giant rhino?!"

Before Anzu, Riko, and Kyoya could argue with her, the bell rang. It was time to get back to class. They decided to continue this discussion later.

The school day seemed to drag on forever. When the final bell rang, everyone was just too happy to leave school and run back home. But Marina decided to take her time walking home. She happened to like passing by the stores and watching the squirrels scuttle about. Singing loudly to herself certainly helped.

_"Everything changes as time goes on,_

_But don't let fear of change scare you,_

_Sometimes something new is all you need,_

_In order to see the what the future holds._

_The flame of life is still shining_

_Its light radiant for all to see,_

_You better catch it or you'll miss your chance,_

_To see what life has in store for you._

_If it's not there, I'll be the spark_

_That lights your heart up._

_Don't forget that, my friend,_

_For seeing your warm smile,_

_Is what keeps me going in life."_

She even tapped some sticks she found on fences as though they were drums, keeping to the beat of the song she sang...or rather, made up just recently. Singing while walking home from school always kept her mind off the distractions, such as people gossiping about her. But she stopped upon happening to pass by a small antique store. Shining Antiques, it was called. It had opened a couple months ago, and there hadn't been many customers. Curious, Marina decided to stop and look.

There were some old stuff in there. Some of the items at the window were shiny silver pocket watches, plates with flower paintings on them in varying colors, an old Shirley Temple doll in her signature red polka dotted dress, an old record player, an old style camera, and a figurine consisting of two porcelain doves with their wings outstretched, sitting on intricately crafted pink roses on a wood base. It was very small, about the size of Marina's cell phone.

But what also caught Marina's eye was the girl standing in front of the window, with both hands on the glass, staring intently at the figure. Black hair, bluish green eyes, drab clothing, a tattered pink heart backpack... "Umi-san?"

The girl whipped her head around in confusion upon hearing her name, but a smile appeared once she saw that familiar orange hair. "Oh! Marina-san! Hi!"

"What are you doing here?" Marina asked.

"I'm supposed to be on my way back to the shelter, but..."

Shelter? Just hearing the word made Marina speechless. Umi lived in a shelter? That explained her drab clothing and her messy appearance. "Today's my big sister's birthday today, and I want to get her that dove figure. She loves doves. But I don't have enough money."

So that was why she kept staring at the dove figurine. She wanted to get it for her sister. Marina dug through her pockets, but all she had were two dollars and sixty five cents. They both looked at the price tag. Twenty five dollars. "Yeah. It's expensive," Marina mused. How could they get the money together for that?

Then it hit her.

Marina slammed a fist into her palm with a radiant smile. "I got it!" She pulled her cell phone out and dialed a number. "Hey, Hotaru! You free right now? Awesome! Hey! You still have a bunch of your dad's cookies, right?" Marina went into detail about how they should get together and sell Sojiro's homemade cookies so they can help Umi buy the dove figurine.

It took a while for the girls to get there, but Hotaru brought a box of her father's cookies and put them all into little napkin bags with red ribbons on them. Anzu brought a little table with her that was folded up. Kyoya brought some homemade signs. "I'll make the first purchase!" Riko bought five cookies for five dollars and shared them with the fairies, who secretly hid in her backpack while saving one for herself.

"Thanks, Riko," Marina said and handed the five dollar bill to Umi.

"Mari told us everything. Would it be okay if we helped you out?" Hotaru asked as politely and kindly as she could.

Umi found herself flabbergasted. Why were these girls going out of their way to help her? Don't they have their own lives to worry about? Kyoya got a yellow, cone shaped paper megaphone out and yelled, "We're selling cookies! Come and get some nice, homemade cookies! We have cherry cookies and chocolate chip cookies for sale for a limited time only! Get them before they're gone!" Kyoya yelled in the loudest voice possible.

Riko held up some signs. _"Buy some delicious cookies!"_ They both read in bold, red and blue sharpie marker.

"Cookies for a dollar each! Get them while they're still here! You can't get these anywhere else!" Kyoya yelled through the paper megaphone.

"They're really good! Come and buy some!" Marina yelled with her hands cupping the sides of her mouth.

For the first ten minutes, nobody stopped by. But one child and her mother happened to notice. "Mama! I want a cookie!"

"Alright alright. How much are they?" Holding her child's hand tightly, the mother came over and looked at the napkin bags.

"There's five cookies in each bag, and they bags are one dollar each," Marina explained.

"My sister and her kids might like these too," The woman pulled out a five dollar bill and purchased five napkin bags before leaving.

Marina pumped her fists in the air. "Aw yeah! That's ten dollars!"

"We still need fifteen more if she wants to buy this figurine," Anzu deadpanned, holding up a sign. "Come and get some cookies! They're super duper good!"

"May I buy a bag?" An old man asked.

"Sure! One dollar!" Anzu exclaimed cheerfully.

"Thank you, dears," The old man said before he left.

"That makes eleven dollars," Hotaru calculated the earnings in her head.

A few more customers showed up. A female college student who bought two bags, a little kid making her first purchase by buying one bag, three friends who each bought a bag, two male friends who bought two bags, and one working woman who bought one bag. After that, the interest wavered.

"All you need is five more dollars and you'll be able to buy that pretty bird figurine," Riko told Umi reassuringly.

"I'd buy it myself but I didn't bring any money with me," Anzu said.

"Welcome to our world," Kyoya agreed.

"I really hope the store doesn't close," Umi mused worriedly, clutching the big straps on her backpack.

"It won't. I checked it's ours. It won't close until another three hours, and it's only four right now," Marina explained.

"My mom wants me to be back by five, though," Riko said.

"Same here," Kyoya said.

"Aw, forget it! I'll have some!" Marina handed Umi her two dollars and took two bags, one for herself and one for her mother.

"So three more dollars to go, and we only have two bags left," Hotaru explained.

"You're selling cookies?"

The kids turned around and found themselves aghast. Toshiko? What was she doing here? Of all the people they didn't want to run into, Toshiko was one of them. "Uh...yeah we are. Is that bad?" Anzu asked. Riko clutched her sign tightly and hid behind it, using it like a shield.

"How much are they?"

"Three dollars for the last of them," Kyoya said.

"Do you know her?" Hotaru whispered, kneeling closer to Riko.

"Yeah. She isn't very nice," Riko whispered back.

With a sigh, Toshiko rummaged through her pockets and pulled out three crinkly dollar bills before swiping the bags. "I've been craving sweets for a week now, and my mom won't let me have any. Thanks."

"Uh...you're welcome," Kyoya said as Toshiko walked away. But they could all see her pumping her fists in the air and jumping a little before skipping away happily. That was an odd sight.

"Yay! We're all sold out, and we made twenty five dollars!" Anzu exclaimed cheerfully.

"Yeah! Isn't this great, Umi-chan? You can get your big sister the birthday present!" Riko said as she handed the money to Umi without a second thought. Umi found herself hesitating. Was this a dream? Was this money truly hers now? They worked so hard to make it for her, and she knew it'd be rude to reject it, and she wanted so badly to buy that present for Sorane, so she took it.

"Um...why did you do all this for me?" Umi asked.

"Do we really need a reason to help someone out?" Kyoya asked back.

Umi's face burned with joy, and a radiant smile appeared on her face. "Thank you! Thank you so much! I have to go now! Bye!" Umi stormed into the store, bought the present, and ran back to the shelter. The girls decided to head home as well, happy that they helped someone in need today.

Umi kept the figurine snugly in her backpack, and she smiled the whole way to the shelter. Not even the sight of Sorane's irritated face once again made her smile waver. "Sorane! Sorane!"

"What is it, Umi?" Sorane grumbled as she searched through some more want-ads. "I'm tired from my new job today."

Umi rummaged through her bag and pulled out the figurine. "Here! Happy birthday!"

Sorane's jaw fell open, and her eyes were wide like saucers, as though she saw an alien lay eggs right in front of her. But how did Umi get it? Where did she get the money? "...How did you get this?"

"My classmates helped me raise money to get it. We sold cookies!" Umi explained.

Reluctantly, Sorane took the figurine out of her hands and found herself staring at it. The wings were so intricate and detailed, and the doves themselves looked so delicate and nice. The rose was a faint but delicate shade of pink with some white gradients here and there. It was the first nice thing she ever received in a long time. But then reality came rushing back in, and she stashed it in her old book bag. "Y-You shouldn't be careless with money! You should have bought food or clothes with it! Now go do your homework," Sorane stammered. "I have to be at another job in an hour."

Umi's smile faded and she returned to her bed. Sorane didn't like it? She didn't even thank her for it! How ungrateful! But Umi could see the bags under Sorane's eyes. She always stayed up late, either looking for jobs or because she needed to cry in her pillows. Umi knew how hard it was to find a job, but...Sorane could have at least thanked her! The old Sorane would always smile and thank Umi for anything she did for her.

But the old Sorane was still there. Just squashed by the hardship, but she still struggled to pop out every once in a while. When she got to bed after she came back from her new job at about eleven at night, she took the figurine out of her bag and stared at it with a smile. "Thank you, Umi. I'm sorry I'm not nicer."


	30. Pretty Cure In A Web of Danger

Chapter 28: Spiders are Gross! The Pretty Cure in a Web of Danger!

With a grunt, Fukiko crumpled up yet another piece of paper and stashed it in the plastic trash can by her desk. She picked up her green and pink flower pen and wrote on some flower printed stationary. She didn't even get to finish the sentence before letting out a groan and throwing that paper in the trash.

"Arrrgh! Nothing I write comes out right!" Fukiko groaned as she scratched her hair with her hand. After that, she pressed her head on her desk, contemplating what to do next. Nothing came to mind. She let out an exasperated sigh. _'I want to tell Sagisu-kun how I feel. But how do I even get the words out?_' Fukiko thought.

She had been working on this love letter since yesterday. But no matter how long she sat there, nothing came to her mind, and whatever did come to her mind looked horrible on paper. She looked through her favorite magazines, looked on the internet, and even talked to her friends for advice on how to write this durn love letter. Her friends were of no help, and the advice her magazines gave were too complicated. Sometimes she wondered if she'd be better off if she didn't have feelings for Hiroto.

"I'm hopeless..." Fukiko mused to herself abjectly. "I can't even write a simple love letter. It's supposed to be easy," She stretched her arms out on the table. She wanted to blare some of her favorite boy band music on the computer, but the last time she did that she woke up her parents, and the scolding she got wasn't pretty, so that was a no-go.

If only she had the courage to just tell him! She had liked him since the fifth grade. By Fukiko's standards, she should have told him by now. The fact that she didn't worsened Fukiko's shame.

She could hear her brothers playing pretend fantasy games outside her room. "Rooooar! I'm gonna kill you, dragon!"

"I'm gonna make you all crispy and black, pathetic knight!"

"Keep it down, boys!" Her mother screamed from downstairs, annoyed by all the racket.

With a sigh, Fukiko laid down on her bed, pulled out her I-pod, and turned on some boy band music, hoping it's give her some inspiration. _You are the star that shines so bright, you make the darkness fade away with your light, you gave me hope in a way you are not aware of..._ Sotoumi's voice was so silky and smooth. Out of all the STARRY members, Sotoumi was the boy Fukiko liked the most.

All of a sudden, Yoshie came into her mind, and Fukiko couldn't help but imagine what she'd say if she found out.

_"Hmph! Hiroto-kun deserves better than a wannabe popular girl reject! You're too indecisive and whiny to be his girlfriend!"_

Fukiko yanked out her ear buds and grabbed her phone. Maybe Kyoya could help her out with this.

Kyoya sat in his room, taping some cardboard fins to an empty green bottle attached to a tiny tripod. It looked good so far, and he couldn't wait to launch it soon. All of a sudden, his cell phone rang. He crawled over to it and grabbed it. "Hello?"

Fukiko smiled upon hearing his voice. "Umm...hi, Kyoya-kun. It's me."

"Fuudo? Hey! What's up?"

"Uh, nothing really..." She stammered shyly.

"I can tell you're lying. You always stammer when you lie," Kyoya retorted.

"You're good, aren't you?"

"Of course I am!" Kyoya hit his chest with his fist once. "I'm practically a living lie detector!" He joked.

"Yeah. But anyway...there is something I'm a little unsure about..." Fukiko clutched her cell phone tightly.

"What is it?"

"You know Sagisu-kun, right?"

"Hiroto? Yeah. Why? You got a crush on him?"

Fukiko's face turned red like a tomato. "...How'd you guess?"

"Dunno."

Wow. Kyoya was good. Fukiko had to wonder if being friends with him for a long time helped him develop this talent for guessing what people were saying or doing so correctly. In a way, she liked that about him. "Yes. It's true. I want to write a love letter to him and tell him how I feel, but I can't seem to come up with anything to write down," Fukiko wiped some sweat off of her forehead. "And everything I do write is really corny."

"Just tell him."

"Huh?"

"You need a bunch of flowery words to tell him how you feel, or he won't get it. Don't beat around the bush. Be straight up with him."

Be straight up with him. That told Fukiko everything she needed to know. It was just like Kyoya to just say what he thinks and not bother with trying to muddy anything. Fukiko liked that about him. The doubt in her heart vanished. "You're right."

"Besides, he's a cool dude. I'm sure he'll be happy with whatever you tell him."

"You're probably right."

"Hey..."

"What?"

"...I'm glad we're talking like this again."

Fukiko knew what he meant. "Yeah. I was such an idiot back then."

"I'm over it now. Thanks for...everything."

"You're welcome. I really missed talking to you."

"Me too."

Kyoya and Fukiko found themselves talking about lots of things, such as music, anime, games, the past few years, bottle rockets, clothes, etc. A warm glow enveloped their hearts. It had been so long since they talked like this. Now that they had reconciled, they wondered if they could go back to the way things were before.

"Are you still working on your bottle rockets, Kyoya-kun?"

"Yep! I'm actually in the middle of making one. I'm hoping I can launch it soon."

"You should take a video and post it on YouTube."

"That's a good idea."

"Kyoya-kun?"

"Hm?"

"Do you...have someone you like?"

"Like like?"

"Mm-hmm."

"No. Not really. I'm not the romance type."

"Some of the girls call you and Riko-chan lovebirds. But I think you two look cute together."

"Me and Riko? Naw. We're just friends. She's not the romance type, either. I just can't picture us being more than friends. But she's important to me, and I'm important to her. I don't want to ruin our friendship."

Fukiko smiled. "I know. She's a great friend."

All of a sudden, Fukiko's mother came into her room. "Fukiko! I've been calling you for ten minutes! Your dinner's getting cold!" She yelled.

"Sorry, Mom! Hang on a sec!" Fukiko called back before getting back to Kyoya. "Sorry. Gotta go."

"I'll talk to you tomorrow. Okay?"

"Sure. Bye!" With that, Fukiko hung up.

"Goodness. If you keep talking on the phone for hours, our phone bill's going to be insane!" Fukiko's mother scolded, but the girl didn't notice. After dinner, the words finally came to her mind, and when she put them down on paper, it didn't look corny at all.

She hoped Hiroto would like it.

* * *

Hotaru sat on her bed reading a new book on astronomy she purchased yesterday, with Starbeam reading through one of her detective novels. "Goodness, the pacing is immensely brisk, and the plot structure is near derelict. I am afraid I cannot fathom the events transpiring in this novella," Starbeam mused out loud.

"I take it you don't like it?" Hotaru asked.

"No, I don't," Starbeam replied as she put the book down. Hotaru got up and put some books in her school bag.

_Knock knock_. A knocking sound made them turn toward the window. What they saw was unexpected: a grey fairy with diamond shaped ears with purple tips on them, wearing a mail man's uniform, setting off his brown eyes. Starbeam smiled and flew over to open the window. "Skye! You actually journeyed to Earth?!"

Skye tipped his hat to Starbeam. "Evening, ma'am," He told her shyly, his face turning red.

"How did you manage to come here? How did you track us down?"

"Microchip."

"Oh."

Skye rummaged through his black bag and pulled out a large letter, handing it to Starbeam. "It's from your parents."

Never had Starbeam heard something so angelic. Her green eyes glimmered like she was a child in a large candy shop. "Thank you! My gratitude is overwhelming! By the way, how is your family?"

"They survived the attacks," Skye's smile faded. "But some kids in my neighborhood didn't make it, sad to say."

With a kind, sympathetic expression, Starbeam wrapped her arms around Skye and held him close. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"Me too," Skye pulled himself out of Starbeam's arms and put his hat back on. "You have a good one, ma'am. Stay safe."

"You do the same!"

With a wave, Skye ascended into the sky to return to Rozaniela. Starbeam found herself squealing loudly. "It's here! It's here! It's here at last!"

"Shhh!" Hotaru raised a finger to her mouth. "You'll wake everyone up!"

"I simply must tell my sisters about this! Bye!" Starbeam dashed out the window to track down her sisters. Hotaru sighed and left for school.

Starbeam knocked on all of their windows, and managed to gather everyone in the big tree in Anzu's backyard. It was thick enough to hide them from few, but there was enough morning light to allow them to read the letter. Sunbeam, Moonbeam, and Lovebeam gathered around her with wide eyes brimming with curiosity, like they were waiting for presents.

"Open it! Open it! Hurry!" Sunbeam exclaimed, jumping up and down.

"She'll open it. Calm down," Moonbeam told her.

The light blue fairy opened the letter and pulled out its contents. Five whole pages of paper were crammed inside the envelope. "Read it! Read it!" Sunbeam exclaimed.

"No! I wanna read it!" Lovebeam tried to grab the papers, but Starbeam kept them out of her reach.

"You mustn't be so impatient, Lovebeam. I'll read it," Starbeam told her firmly. Lovebeam stuck out her lips and sat on the branch with her arms crossed. Starbeam read the letter out loud.

**To Our Beloved Daughters,**

**We're so glad to see you're safe and sound! Is Earth treating you well? Knowing that you're all alive is what keeps us all going every day and night. We're terribly sorry we didn't mail you sooner. The King and Queen issued a ban on mail exchange between Earth and Rozaniela out of fear of getting intercepted.**

"So THAT's why they never mailed us back until now!" Sunbeam exclaimed, swinging her hand in the air. Moonbeam pressed on her shoulder and made her sit down.

"What else does it say?" Lovebeam asked.

**We figured it'd be best to write this letter right after the ban was lifted. It makes us so happy to know that you're doing well on Earth. It's been a long time since we've been there ourselves. Those Pretty Cure girls you told us about seem like great people. We only wish they didn't have to get involved in this mess. They're so young, you say! Twelve to fifteen years old isn't a good age to be shouldering the burden of saving two worlds.**

The letter went on to talk about the fairies' parents exploits in saving the Rozanielan folk, the information they've gathered, the casualties they mourned, the peoples' efforts to bring the planet back to its original state, etc. Lovebeam covered her face with her ears upon hearing about the people who died in Zenjin's attack. She had experienced enough death and destruction already.

"Mom and Dad are so brave," Sunbeam said with a smile.

"Yeah. I think a lot of people would have died if Dad wasn't there," Moonbeam said.

"We are lucky to have such wonderful parents," Starbeam told them gratefully.

"Read the rest of it!" Lovebeam begged like a little kid.

**Some of us heard about the battle the Pretty Cure had against Zenjin on Rozaniela. We hope the Pretty Cure are okay! We heard that some citizens tried to arrest Zenjin but he escaped. Please, do be careful. We can't lose you. If you all died, we wouldn't be able to go on. Speaking of which, you remember your friend Mimosa, don't you? Her mother and sisters all died in the attacks, and she hasn't been the same. She has nightmares and panic attacks almost every day.**

Sunbeam could tell most of the letter was written in her father's scraggly but readable handwriting.

**My friend Meadowlark has diagnosed her with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and he's working with her father to help her cope with her trauma. I haven't heard much from him lately, so I don't know what Mimosa's prognosis is. It's such a shame. She used to be a happy and cheerful fairy, too. I only pray that she gets through this.**

Moonbeam's ears drooped downward. Her heart went out to her friend. She wished she could go and visit her. She had heard about what happened to her family from Patch on their first trip back to Rozaniela.

"Mimosa's got it rough, hasn't she?" Sunbeam asked. "We ought to go visit her when we can."

"Definitely," Lovebeam said.

Starbeam continued reading. She noticed that this paragraph was written in her mother's handwriting.

**I've been working day and night to help build some houses for the homeless, and everything's going well so far. Everyone is such a great help, I can actually get some sleep at night. By the way, a friend of mine who went to Earth brought back a lovely treat called dorayaki. They're simply superb! She even gave me the recipe! When this whole mess is over and we're together again, I'll definitely make some. I think you'll all love it, but do remember to eat your fruits and vegetables. They're essential for a growing fairy.  
**

**Your father's been hard at work, saving lives left and right. He's saved over one million lives with the help of his friends and coworkers, even some citizens themselves! The people and creatures here are wonderful, and without their help, I don't think we'd have saved so many lives. Anyway, I hope you girls are safe. Be careful out there. Don't let anything get you down. I don't know when we'll be able to come to Earth, but now that the ban on mail has been lifted, we can definitely write more, so expect some more letters from us! We had Skye go to Earth since he's a reliable young chap. We trust him dearly. We're sorry we can't be there for you in person. You'll have to be patient for a little while longer.**

**We're doing everything we can here. Take good care of each other, and don't lose sight of who you are! We love you and pray for your safety and health every day!**

**Sincerely yours,**

**Your parents, Hornbeam and Crossbeam**

**P.S. We ran into your other friends sometime last week. Patch, Flicker, Twinkle, BelBel, Berry, Siren, and a few others. They want to tell you that they say hi and that they miss you. They made a memorial at school for those who've fallen, Puff, Sugarbelle, and Trixiebelle included. They're praying for your safety as well, and doing a lot for your sake. Be safe for them and us! We love you! Also, you have a package from us coming soon. It'll be small, but we hope it'll liven your spirits a bit. A friend of ours gave us some Earth money, but we decided to send it to you in case you need anything on Earth.**

There were lots of heart and star shapes drawn in color pencil around the letter. Moonbeam couldn't help but let out a sob and wiped some tears away. Lovebeam hid her face in her fluffy ears. Starbeam pulled out three $100 bills and hid them in the brooch on her ribbon. Sunbeam twiddled one of her ears in between her hands.

"I want to see them..." Moonbeam said. Sunbeam walked over to her and stroke her long ears gently.

"Me too, Moonbeam. Me too," Sunbeam whispered reassuringly. But she could tell her reassurance sounded a little forced.

"Well, at least we know for sure that they're alive and well," Starbeam told them with a faint smile on her blue face.

"You got that right," Lovebeam added. For the pink fairy, anything from her parents was better than nothing at all.

For a brief moment, the fairy sisters found themselves closer to their parents than ever. They prayed for their safety and health, just like their parents were praying for them, wishing them well.

* * *

"Wow, Fukiko-chan. You look pretty today," Riko commented when Fukiko came into homeroom.

She was right. Fukiko was wearing a small, reddish violet dress with a three tiered ruffled skirt underneath a sleeveless, unbuttoned black cardigan. She had a matching dark reddish violet flower hair clip in her hair, and black shoes. "You think so? Thanks."

Kyoya noticed a pink envelope in her hands. He didn't ask about it, because he knew what was in it. "Hey, Fuudo! Did you get Mizuki Mona's new album? It just came out last week!" Chinami asked cheerfully.

"I sure did, girlfriend!" She high fived Chinami happily.

Marina looked over at Anzu. The first thing she, and the rest of their quirky social circle noticed was that Anzu looked sick. Not really, but she had an odd look on her face like she just saw a horror movie that officially ruined her to the point of insanity.

"What the heck is wrong with you?" Marina asked pertly.

"Uuuugh…" Anzu groaned weakly.

"Did you eat something bad?" Fukiko asked worriedly.

Anzu shook her head weakly.

"Then what?" Kyoya asked.

"Eraserhead. That's all you need to know. I've met my match," Anzu croaked. Everyone looked at each other with confused faces.

"That a movie or something?" Kyoya asked.

"Yes. Very freaky horror movie. Weird...baby...thing...I'm losing my mind!" Anzu groaned. None of them realized that Yoshie was giving them the stinkeye from a few desks over.

Marina crossed her arms. "Wow. That's new coming from you. You usually love horror movies," Marina commented.

Yoshie couldn't resist. "You know, instead of watching gross movies, you'd be a lot more popular if you didn't dress like you came out of one!" Yoshie exclaimed loud enough for all to hear.

"Shut up, Inoue!" Kyoya snapped vehemently.

"Keep your voices down, kids!" The teacher called out, prompting Kyoya and Yoshie to shut their mouths. But he did notice something. Yoshie was wearing long sleeved shirts and long jean pants. In summer. He had to wonder how she wasn't getting hot and sweaty from wearing those.

Fukiko handed a pink envelope to Hiroto and stormed back to her seat with a face that was red like a tomato.

"Wow! You did it, Fuudo!" Chinami exclaimed happily.

"I didn't think you had it in you!" Kyoya added with a bright smile on his face.

"I'm scared. What if he doesn't like me? What if he thinks I'm trying to pull some kind of prank on him?" Fukiko worried.

"Sagisu-kun's not that kind of kid," Chinami told her reassuringly.

On the other hand, Toshiko and Shizuka saw the entire thing, with differing reactions. "Awww! Why did Dounowaki give Sagisu a love letter?! She beat me to it!" Shizuka complained.

"Get real, Shizu-chan. He's way out of your league anyway," Toshiko piped in. Silently, Daizo flashed Hiroto a thumb's up.

Confused, Hiroto brushed his black hair with his hand before opening the envelope. It has a red heart on the front of it. He pulled out the small paper, opened it, and read what's inside. His blue eyes scanned the neatly folded Ruby Gloom themed stationary paper, soaking up the pretty katakana written all over it.

_Sagisu-kun,_

_I know I should tell you these things in person, but I'm too shy to do it, so I'm writing it down. I hope you don't think this is weird, but I've liked you ever since the 5th grade. You've always just gone with the flow, completely calm about everything going on around you. I wish I could be like you. If you already like someone, that's perfectly fine. I just need to get this out so you'll at least know. _

_Also, I couldn't help but notice you're really into Mizuki Mona and her music. She's my favorite singer, too! I love her song "Natsuzora." It always puts me in a good mood. Maybe we can get together and gush over her music sometime. Did you know she's on the cover of this month's Kira*Kira Smile? I already have her new single._

_Sincerely,_

_Dounowaki Fukiko Nanako._

Hiroto found himself smiling. Not in a skeevy, mischievous kind of way, like he thought her letter was silly or a joke. No, he actually liked Fukiko's letter. A warm glow enveloped his heart. He never knew any of this about Fukiko. He always thought a pretty girl like her was out of his league. He never expected her to like him...but she does. Knowing this made him smile warmly. But before he could look over it some more, he noticed a shadow behind him. He turned around to find a pair of curious eyes behind him.

"Dai?!" Hiroto yelped.

"Oooooh! Is that a love letter?" Daizo inquired mischievously.

"Yeah. So?" Hiroto deadpanned after calming down.

"Who's it from?" Daizo asked before peering over Hiroto's shoulder. "Dounowaki? About time. She's been crushing on you since you moved here," He added.

"Got a problem with that?"

"No way, man. I'm just saying."

Hiroto chuckled a bit before putting the letter in his bag. "Do you ever wish a girl asked you out?"

"Me? Naaah. I'm not into that mushy gushy romance stuff," Daizo replied. But his thoughts were another thing entirely. _'You finally got the guts to tell him, didn't ya? Good job, Fuudo,'_ Daizo thought sweetly before returning to his unfinished homework. He grumbled as he worked on it, wishing it wasn't so boring. He wished he was at the park right now, riding his skateboard all through the woods.

Fukiko was just too happy and fluttery after giving Hiroto that letter. She felt like bursting into song, but instead chose to read her current issue of Kira*Kira Smile. The celebratory butterflies flying around in her stomach burst into a parade, though she made sure to keep them all inside so she wouldn't disrupt classes or draw unwanted attention.

Unfortunately for her, unwanted attention came anyway. During recess, Fukiko gushed over more pages of her Kira*Kira Smile copy, mostly drooling over the young, handsome men gracing some of the pages with their smiles, winks, and good looks. Before she could read more, she saw a shadow loom over her. She looked up to find a not very happy looking girl standing in front of her with crossed arms. She had short but wavy dark brown hair going to her chin, curled at the ends, with small, oval shaped glasses covering her deep blue eyes.

"What's up?" Fukiko stammered with a confused face and tone.

"Fess up, Dounowaki! Word on the street is that you have a thing for Hiroto-kun! Is that true?" Shizuka demanded like she was the boss.

Fukiko clutched her magazine, resolving to stand her ground. "Yes. I do. Is that wrong?" She replied in a calm, matter of fact way.

Shizuka crossed her arms. "I really don't see why he'd ever want to go anywhere near you! For all we know, he might even hate your guts! Do you really think a cool guy like him would actually return your feelings?"

"If he doesn't, that's fine. I just wanted to tell him how I feel. But you really don't have to make a big deal out of it. It's not like the Pope is pregnant or anything," Fukiko deadpanned.

"Uh...well, you better give up! Because I like Hiroto-kun, and he deserves someone like me! Not some prissy little froo-froo reject who hangs out with idiots and cri-" She was about to rant and use some ableist slurs until a certain someone stepped into the fray. "Hi-Hiroto-kun!"

"Quit harassing Fukiko," Hiroto told her calmly but firmly. "You really shouldn't hate on people just for being ten feet near someone. It's cliché and won't win you any points in the popularity department. And don't you dare insult her and her friends."

Silently, Shizuka walked away with a glum look on her face. "Thanks, Hiroto-kun," Fukiko told him gratefully.

"Don't mention it. By the way, I'm having a little party at my house next weekend, and I was wondering if maybe you'd like to come," Hiroto told her.

Fukiko wanted to explode from too much happiness. "S-S-S-Sure! I'd love to go! I'll have to ask my parents though, and chances are Mom won't let me."

"That's okay. Let me know when you get some answers. Okay?" Hiroto said before walking away.

Now Fukiko found it okay to squeal like a little girl. "Kyaaaa! Hiroto-kun! Hiroto-kun! Hiroto-kun! Hiroto-kun!" She kept repeating his name over and over again in an annoyingly high pitched voice.

"She needs to calm down a bit," Chinami said with her ears covered. Riko nodded in agreement, covering her own ears as well.

* * *

Zenjin could no longer deny the cold reality that slapped him in the face. Decebal is gone, nowhere to be seen. Beileag abandoned him.

Zenjin meandered through a remote part of Rozaniela, not paying any attention to anything around him. The colorful trees covered with glossy, vivacious purple and pink newborn blooms, the trio of birds singing and twittering their lovely little songs, and a school of rabbits hopping to a new destination. No, he didn't care for any of these. No matter how much the sun shined, no matter how many new flowers sprang up, and no matter how many cute animals came to endear him with their cuteness, Zenjin's world was nothing but black. Black as oblivion. It crashed in front of him the day Decebal and Beileag left.

What could he do now?

He looked up to find a relatively normal sized, mint green house with a rectangle shaped red door. The house was about one storey high, with a grey roof, a sturdy white fence surrounding the back yard, and some thick, spiny, prickly shrubs that looked like they hadn't been cut in years. Unlike all the other houses that he decimated, this one was still completely intact, inside and out.

Zenjin turned the doorknob and walked inside. He happened upon the living room, with the big red couch, snow white walls, the expensive vases Decebal would keep all over the place, a huge pile of high heeled shoes in one corner of the room, and a little white table. One of its legs was duct taped because it broke in half, namely because Zenjin threw it at the wall and broke one of the legs. A tall lamp loomed over everything.

'_It hasn't changed one bit. It's the same as it's always been,'_ He thought as memories of himself, Beileag, and Decebal hanging out and playing in this living room flashed through his mind. As annoying as he found them to be at times, even when he was young, he always liked it when they would pretend to be in their troupe, acting out little plays, turning up their hammy voices, and shouting very melodramatic lines.

Next came the kitchen. It was also medium sized, with white walls, an oven and stove combination, many wooden cupboards with lots of herbs, bags of food and ingredients, and pots and pans in them, a sink, a counter made of granite, and some drawers with cooking utensils in them, like spoons, forks, and knives. Zenjin remembered messing this place up quite a bit when Decebal tried to bake cookies for them and he threw the dough all over the walls in a wild and violent tantrum. He also remembered Beileag feeding Decebal some chocolate covered strawberries once, and he liked them, which made Beileag really happy. With a grunt, he left the kitchen. He just wanted to get away from that blasted stove. _'I hate stoves. They burn,'_ Zenjin thought as he trotted through the familiar hallways he once ran through whenever he had to chance.

He stopped at the little room that was once his room. Unlike most rooms that teenaged boys owned and liked to mess up, Zenjin's room was now sort of empty, with only a bed with gray blankets and pillows on it, some drawers he kept his clothes in, a small closet, and a flower shaped light dangling from the ceiling. Strewn on the floor were some toys he played with when he was adopted at ten, like some old Nascar toys, a wooden dreidel, and a very small set of bongos, small enough for a little kid to play. On impulse, Zenjin sat down on the floor of his room criss-cross pretzel style in front of the dreidel and the bongos. He took the dreidel and spun it around. He watched it spin until it fell back to the floor on its side. He then pulled the bongos in front of him and gently tapped them with his hands.

_Pum. Pum. Pum pum pum. Pum. Pum. Pum pum pum._

With this, he whistled the song that has latched to his brain for his whole life. It was his earliest memory, and he whistled in tune with the beat of his bongos. He made sure not to tap them too hard, as he didn't want his ears to be bombarded with loud stimulation right now. Just his tapping and small whistling took him away from the cold, dark, unforgiving reality, the reality that took Decebal and Beileag away from him. After a while, he stopped whistling and drumming.

Zenjin never thought he'd ever have happiness. For the first ten years of his life, all he experienced was cruelty at the hands of that woman. His life consisted of endless beatings, yelling, insults, loss of things he loved such as Tove the gray kitten, hunger, chains, and blame, all heaped on him by the evil woman. He remembered how wide her eyes would get if he did anything at all, how hard her hands would slap his face to the point where he'd bleed and bruise, the wicked smiles she'd have on her face-cold, wicked, evil, sadistic smiles painted all over that face of hers-and the accusations she would heap on him. Something about taking her daughter away. He didn't know. He didn't want to think about that monster and the things she did to him: forcing him to sleep in the basement and the dog house sometimes, making him eat things he shouldn't like a bar of soap or dog excrement, beating him with either her hands or her favorite whip…

He didn't think those days could ever end. But they did. He saw the flash of green coming in to scoop him out of the woman's clutches, taking him away from that horror house for good. He was brought to this house, showered with love, given nice clothes, food, a warm bed. No beatings. No punishment for stupid things. No name calling. No yelling. Well, there was yelling, but it was only directed at him when he did something he shouldn't have, and even those moments were rare and far in between. Plus, it was mostly Beileag doing it because he would rip her dresses apart or Decebal would say something that'd set her off, or they'd call her by her real name.

They had happy times together. They were...happy. Zenjin didn't know what a smile looked like for a long time, nor did he understand the concept of happiness. It was such an alien thing. But Decebal and Beileag defined it for him.

Only now, they were gone, and the happiness he thought he grasped has finally been taken from him.

He took the dreidel and threw it at the wall. With a roar, he put his hands on the drawers and toppled it over, sending some shirts and socks flying. "Why?! Why did you leave me?! Was everything we had all a big fat lie?!" Zenjin roared as he punched quite a big hole in the wall, so much so that the entire wall came crashing down, dissolving into nothing but a big, useless pile of debris. He slumped back on the floor.

'_I hate happy people. They have what I don't. They don't suffer like I do! They don't deserve one lick of happiness! It's all an illusion anyway!'_ Zenjin roared in his brain before blowing his bed to pieces, sending pillow feathers and mattress springs flying. One of them almost went into Zenjin's eye had he not knocked it away with his hand. "If I can't be happy...then why should everyone else on this stinkin' planet?!" With that, he snapped his fingers and teleported to Earth. He used to enjoy being in this house. It took him away from the evil woman. But now, it reminded him of their betrayal.

He couldn't understand what drove them to abandon him like that. They adopted him. They raised him for five years, teaching him everything they knew and believed in. They instilled in him everything that made Zenjin who he was today. They taught him that it was okay for him to be himself, to be angry, to do whatever he wants. The woman never let him do any of those things. The strange yet interesting duo taught him everything, especially Decebal, whom Zenjin adored and looked up to like he was the father he never had. No, Decebal WAS a father to him.

"_You're strong, Zenny boy. Don't let anyone tell you you're weak. Weakness only brings you down and keeps you from doing what you want."_

"_People here don't know what suffering is. But you do. You've experienced it for ten whole years. You should be out there telling the whole world that its suffering is petty compared to what you went through."_

"_The important thing is to be yourself. Don't listen when people tell you what you should and shouldn't be. People are always telling everyone how to act, how to dress, how to behave, all for petty and superficial reasons. Be you, Zenjin. Be everything you wish to be."_

"_It is hardship that makes us who we are, not eternal happiness, sloth, and prosperity. You know what hardship is, so you know who you are."_

Zenjin did everything Decebal asked him to, and always went to him whenever he was having a problem. He was convinced they would be together forever. But now, that fantasy had been torn to shreds, stomped on, and left to disappear into thin air, forever imprisoned in oblivion.

Before, Zenjin felt like he could take on the whole world. He has the means to do so. But now, even with all the power in the world, he doesn't see a future for himself. Even thinking about the very next day made him want to drop dead, like he never existed. He wanted to destroy everything. Everything.

However, even as Zenjin wanted to destroy everything, he found no motivation to do so. He found himself sitting near a lake. For a moment, he thought he was back in Rozaniela, in the same place where Beileag betrayed him. But upon seeing a forest of trees surrounding him, he realized that this is not the case. Even so, he wanted to get away. Lakes reminded him too much of Beileag. He ran like he was being chased. Not fearfully like the time when he wanted to run the heck away from Cure Twilight when she tried to beat the living daylights out of him. After a while, he found himself out of breath and slumped in front of a small tree.

It was here that a glint within a sunbeam caught his eye. Something reflected the sun's rays, causing a light to shine in his red eye. Curious, he crawled over to it. He didn't care if his pants got dirty. For the most part, he really didn't mind being dirty. Getting dirty was better than getting beaten by that woman. As he got closer, he saw something protruding from the dirt.

A heart shaped cap appeared from the ground like a blossoming flower. Out of curiosity, Zenjin pulled it out of the dirt. As it turned out, the heart shaped cap was attached to a transparent, green, star shaped perfume bottle. He saw something else underneath the dirt as well, so he dug through it. He unearthed another star shaped perfume bottle, but this one was a silvery white. He took them both in his hands. He didn't like how warm and loving they felt on his hands, but he remembered something.

The Pretty Cure had things like these whenever they'd transform. He couldn't remember what they were called, but he put them in his pockets. "These might be useful," He muttered to himself with a wicked smile before standing up and walking away.

Already a plan was forming in his mind. He could find two girls who could become Pretty Cure, and he could tailor them into his personal servants, like Decebal did with him, only it was to make him stronger. How great does that sound? For him, anyway. Pity to the poor girls whose hearts resonate with those Heart Lighters.

He got his motivation back, and found himself flying again. He hopped across rooftops and forests, hoping for something he can blow up. Oh. how he loved the sight of flames consuming buildings, the lucid sounds of people screaming in pain before their deaths, and the smell of smoke clouds curling in the air, polluting everything around it. He heard three kids-two boys and a girl-down on a sidewalk singing some song he never heard before.

"_Take a melody,_

_Simple as can be,_

_Give it some words and,_

_Sweet harmony._

_Raise your voices,_

_All day long now love grows strong now,_

_Sing a melody of love, oh love."_

In a way, the song reminded him of the song he liked to whistle. But he didn't like the amount of love coming from it, so he tried to erase it from his mind. Soon, he happened to come within the vicinity of Hikaribashi Middle School. Kids are out on the blacktop, doing whatever it was they liked doing.

He hated their smiles, their merry laughter, the fact that they were interacting and having fun. He wasted no time firing a ball of energy just outside the blacktop, blowing out a huge chunk of the metal fence. Some kids fell to the concrete, screaming in fear.

"Oh my God! What just happened?!"

"Are we being attacked?!"

"Someone tell a teacher!"

"Kids! We have to evacuate!"

They only knew one person who would do this.

"Kyah!"

"Fukiko!"

Fukiko was face down on the concrete, unable to get up because of a huge scab on her left knee. Hiroto raced to the scene and helped her up, but out from the smoke cloud appeared Zenjin, and he wasted no time firing a ball of energy at him, sending him flying into the fence, exposing his Soul Portal. Fukiko managed to get up and limp to the nearest safe place outside the fence. Chinami appeared to lead her away from the blacktop.

"Should we call Hotaru-chan?" Riko asked.

"I'd like to, but she might get in trouble at school. Let's try to handle it here," Anzu told them. They hid in a safe spot where no one would see them, got their Heart Lighters out, and proceeded to transform. It's a good thing they brought those and their Light Bringers with them.

"_Pretty Cure, let the light shine!"_

"I am the light that will brighten up your world! Cure Twilight!"

"I am the light that will bring in the new day! Cure Dawn!"

"I am the light that will warm your heart! Cure Dusk!"

Zenjin didn't waste any time yanking Hiroto's Soul Orb out and turned it into a giant black animal. He didn't stick around, though, as he disappeared as soon as he appeared. The trio of Pretty Cure appeared, ready to fight the gigantic black animal that came from Hiroto's soul. But Cure Twilight found herself frozen with wide green eyes absolutely overflowing with fear. Not at the situation per se, but the type of animal Hiroto's soul got turned into.

A giant tarantula.

With a bloodcurdling scream, she ran away from the school like the wind.

"What the?! RIKOOO!" Cure Dusk roared.

"I'll get her!" Cure Dawn exclaimed as she chased after the fearful purple cure.

"GETAWAYGETAWAYGETAWAYGETAWAAAAAAY!" Cure Twilight screamed at the top of her lungs as she sprinted away from the school like her house is on fire. Finally, unable to run anymore, she stopped and sat in between some trees. Cure Dawn managed to catch up with her using the wings on her shoes.

"Hey. What's wrong, Twi?" Cure Dawn asked. she grew concerned as soon as she saw Cure Twilight's absolutely horrified expression. The purple cure looked like she was ready to burst into tears. She rocked back and forth quite violently while clinging to herself like she was trying to squeeze the fear right out.

"I-I-I-I-I-I can't fight that thing!" Cure Twilight squealed helplessly.

It didn't take much for Cure Dawn to figure it out. "Are you...afraid of spiders?"

"YES! I AM! I'M SCARED OF SPIDERS! I HATE THEM! I hate every single one of those icky, fuzzy, poisonous creatures of death!" Cure Twilight bellowed fearfully. "I can't stand even being near those beasts!"

Although Cure Dawn is a bit weirded out by Twilight's fear of spiders, she could understand her friend not wanting to fight. Cure Dusk fired her Dusk Medley at the giant tarantula with all her might, managing to drive it away from the school and into the neighborhood. Cure Dawn put her shoulder on the cowering purple girl's shoulder. "It's okay. You don't have to fight. Take all the time you need to calm down a bit. We'll take it from here," Cure Dawn told her softly in a gentle voice.

"You're...not mad at me?" Cure Twilight asked fearfully, eyes overflowing with tears.

With a smile, Cure Dawn shook her head. "Why would I be? I wouldn't like it if I had to face something I was afraid of. In fact, did you know I'm afraid of ferrets?"

"Huh? You? Afraid of ferrets? I never knew that! But then…" Cure Twilight remembered the fight with Izumi, and she got turned into a Corrupt Sentinel that was a ferret. "How were you able to fight it back then?"

"I made sure to keep it together. I may be afraid of them, but during times like that, I have to be brave or people will die. I can't let my fear stop me. I'll go help Dusk now. You can join us when you're ready," Cure Dawn told her before standing up and flying back to help Cure Dusk.

Cure Twilight could feel herself become calmer. She's liked Anzu ever since they first met, but she never knew she would be so kind, insightful, and understanding. She didn't yell at her or force her to do anything she didn't want to. She just gently supported her, understood her fears, and is allowing her to take some time to sit down, calm down, and think. Nobody in her earlier school days ever did that, especially not kids her own age. Why couldn't she have met her long ago?

But she had to admit, Anzu made some really good points, and a tsunami of guilt consumed her scared heart. _'My friends are putting their lives on the line...and if they die it'll be all my fault because I'm too scared of spiders! Some hero I am!'_ Cure Twilight thought ruefully before pulling out her phone and making a call.

"Lovebeam? Can you get your sisters and come out to the school? Cures Dawn and Dusk need your help," She told her before hanging up rather abruptly. Anzu was right. She can't let her fear control her. Besides, her being afraid of spiders was the least of their problems. She forced herself to stand up and fly toward the spider with the wings on her shoes flapping valiantly.

She had to do this. Heroes can be afraid too, but she wasn't going to let her fear control her. She couldn't lose her friends. Her friends are way more important than spiders.

"Dusk Medley!"

"Golden Dawn Explosion!"

"Twilight Serenade!"

All three girls launched their attacks on the giant spider, managing to land some huge hits on it. "Hey, Twi! What took you-?!" Cure Dusk was about to angrily interrogate her until she saw the cat eared girl shaking like a leaf, trying to put on a brave face.

"Let's...squash this...bug! EEEEEK! Twilight Masquerade!" She stammered at first, but with a yelp, she fired a rain of purple bubbles at the giant furry tarantula, blinding it and keeping it from doing anymore damage to the neighborhood. All of a sudden, four more energy beams fired at the spider.

"Hey girls! Sorry we're late!" Lovebeam exclaimed as she flew toward them as fast as she could, with her three younger sisters all trailing behind her.

"We came as fast as we could!" Sunbeam said.

"You sure are fast!" Cure Dusk exclaimed.

"Are...you okay, Riko-chan?" Moonbeam asked, noticing Cure Twilight looking more scared than a baby kitten lost in the street.

"Can we just beat this thing already?! I wanna go home!" Cure Twilight shouted fearfully as she hugged Moonbeam so tight she almost suffocated her.

"Can't...breathe…"

Cure Dawn and Dusk proceeded to fly at the giant hairy spider and land flurries of strong punches and kicks to it. They made sure to avoid its mouth so they don't become spider lunch. Soon, the four fairy sisters rammed themselves onto the spider's body, managing to keep it from eating anything. The Light Bringers of both Cures Dawn and Dusk began glowing. As a safety precaution, Cure Twilight handed hers to Starbeam.

"I'm afraid that if I use it I might get corrupted, so can you hold this for me?" Cure Twilight asked.

"I'll be more than happy to, Cure Twilight," Starbeam told her kindly. The purple cure smiled at Starbeam's understanding.

Cure Dawn and Dusk wasted no time unleashing their most powerful attacks on the giant hairy tarantula. "Mandarin Dusk Inferno!"

"Dawn Flame!"

Cure Twilight followed as well despite looking like she's about to explode into tears. "Twilight Serenade!"

The tarantula roared with pain upon getting hit with those attacks, and dissolved into nothing, leaving behind a glass orb that's a coal black color. Cure Twilight exhaled a sigh of relief, took the orb, and dropped it into Hiroto's Soul Portal.

"Phew! That was a tough one," Cure Dawn said as she wiped some sweat off her forehead. Without warning, Cure Twilight fell to her knees and suddenly began bawling at the top of her lungs.

"Spiders are gross! I wanna go home!" Cure Twilight wailed loudly, making absolutely no attempt to dry any of her tears or remove some snot dripping out of her nose.

"Okay! Why didn't you fight with us?! We could have finished it off a lot easier if you-" Cure Dusk was about to scold her before Cure Dawn put a hand to her mouth.

"She's afraid of spiders. Don't demonize her for it. Just be happy we saved everyone before anything got bad," Cure Dawn deadpanned, causing Dusk to finally calm down. Moonbeam and Sunbeam floated over to the bawling cat eared girl and nuzzled her, hoping their reassurance will calm her down a bit. Riko cried for about twenty or so minutes, but she managed to calm down once she cried out all of her pent up fright and sorrow. After that, they flew to the place where everyone evacuated and turned back to normal. Later on, the teachers announced that school will be closed for tomorrow so they'll have a free day off, which made everyone cheer like they were at the Super Bowl.

After that, some parents came and picked their kids up from the other school. Arinao wasted no time taking Riko home as he was quite worried about her, albeit happy that she's okay. Riko, on the other hand, is even happier with the fact that not only did they manage to save Hiroto and defeat the Corrupt Sentinel without any deaths, but that she doesn't have to deal with that scary tarantula anymore.


	31. New Pretty Cures!

Chapter 29: New Pretty Cures?! Who Are They?

The kids were very excited about the free day off, even if it had been achieved by less than ethical methods thanks to that dastardly Zenjin. Marina spent that day practicing her guitar and bongos or doing karate at the local dojo. Oh, how she loved to be lost in her music, especially the music she herself created. She looked up at her Blue Moon poster, hoping she could be just like her favorite singers when she grows up.

Anzu spent it either pretending to be a theater actress or drawing fantasy creatures. Riko spent it either writing her Twilight Cat fan fiction, watching Maple Town with Starbeam, playing games like Pokemon or Mother (GameBoy Advance versions), or drawing a new picture of Kyoya for...well, Kyoya. Kyoya spent it making bottle rockets on his own homemade rocket launcher pad. They wanted the free school day to go on forever, but reality had to be faced some time.

"YEEEEAAAAH! FINALLY!" Marina burst through homeroom, her golden eyes wide and a smile so radiant it could melt icicles. Everyone turned to look, flummoxed by how uncharacteristically cheerful she was.

Kyoya raised an eyebrow. "What's got you in a tizzy?"

"I'm in the school band!" Marina shouted loudly for all to hear, even the teacher. "After all these years I'm FINALLY in the school band!"

"Voices down!" The teacher exclaimed. Marina quieted down after that, but it didn't contain her excitement any.

"Congrats, Mari-chan!" Riko whispered.

"Thanks!" Marina replied, basking in their praise.

"Wait, what kept you from joining the band?" Anzu asked.

"I've been trying to get in ever since I came here, but they always rejected me. Mostly the kids, because they claim someone like me will ruin their reputation, if you know what I mean," Marina explained. They all understood what she meant.

"They can't exclude you like that. Isn't that against the rules?" Kyoya asked.

"I know, right?! But nooo! They obviously can't have a criminal's kid ruin their beautiful band!" Marina replied sarcastically. "I tried to tell them that I'm not like him but do they listen? Noooo!"

"Well, you're in now, so that's great! I'm in the band too! I play drums!" Chinami told her reassuringly.

"Hey! I do too! Mostly bongos because we can't afford drums, but I've always wanted to play those," Marina said happily.

"I'd love to teach you," Chinami said with a smile. "And if the other kids make fun of you, I have your back so don't worry. They'll come around."

"Thanks, Takayama."

"Oh, come on! Call me Chinami or Chi-chan!" She insisted.

"Sure, Chinami."

"I was wondering...have you heard about the school talent show that's coming up soon?" Fukiko asked.

"I've heard about it, but I'm not interested. All I'm good at is drawing and pretending, and I don't like being in front of crowds," Riko piped in.

"I'm definitely participating! I wrote my own song, and I wanna make my debut as a rock star someday!" Marina piped in.

"Sounds cool! Can I be in your band?" Chinami asked.

Marina did a double take. "Wait, seriously?"

"Yeah! I wouldn't mind being in a band. My mom says it's always good to try new things every once in a while, and I like playing drums, so why not? How about we hang out at your house after band practice today?" Chinami exclaimed cheerfully.

"That'd be awesome!" Marina found herself high fiving Chinami quite hard. Who knew she was such a cool girl?

"I'd like to be in it, but there isn't anything I'm really good at except for shopping and buying every volume of Kira*Kira Smile and Suzuki Uta single there is," Fukiko said. "But my mom's teaching me how to sew, and the school exhibition's coming up as well, so I'm gonna try making my own shirt!"

"Doesn't sewing hurt?" Riko asked, noting the band-aids on Fukiko's fingers.

"Yeah, but if you practice enough you get better at it," Fukiko replied.

"Are you gonna be in the talent show, Kyoya?" Anzu asked.

"Heck yeah! I'm gonna make more bottle rockets and launch them!" Kyoya proclaimed.

"Be sure not to break anything," Riko advised.

These kids may not realize it, but for them, going to school was a luxury, an opportunity that some people don't get.

* * *

Zenjin woke up to darkness. After rubbing his eyes, he snapped his fingers, causing the chandelier lights to turn on all by themselves. The light illuminated the room, but even though everything was the same, something was different.

"Hey! Decebal! I want breakfast NOW!" Zenjin screamed so the whole fortress could hear him. The fortress was the only thing here besides Zenjin.

No Decebal or Beileag.

"Oh. Right. They've left me," Zenjin muttered in a soft, wistful voice as the realization slapped him in the face, and rather cruelly. Even he noticed how empty the fortress felt without Decebal or Beileag to order around and make them do whatever he says. Now there's no one to make food for him, argue with, discuss how to defeat the Pretty Cure with, nobody.

He wished they were here. It was so lonely without them. Zenjin didn't feel like being in the fortress anymore.

He changed his clothes and noted the two Heart Lighters sitting on his drawers. Well, if he didn't have Decebal or Beileag, he could always find someone else, and they could be what he needed to destroy those meddling kids once and for all. But his stomach had different priorities. It roared in dire need of food. He walked to the refrigerator. No food in sight.

With a snap of his fingers and a grunt, Zenjin teleported from his fortress to a bustling part of Hikaribashi, full of people going to and fro, toward different destinations. He looked all over for places he could find food in, but he doesn't know any places that sell food. It doesn't help that he can't read or write for the life of him, so how would he know which places sold food unless he asked someone?

No, he couldn't ask anyone. What would he say to them? Not only that, he'd much rather blow people up than ask them about something commonplace like a little idiot. He walked around for a while to see if there are any places that sell food. He did see a vending machine. His hand glowed a bit, causing a can of soda to go right through the glass, but not to the point of breaking it. He opened the can and drank the soda. Once he finished, he threw it on the sidewalk.

Later, he found himself in front of a big building. He went inside and found himself surprised. The place was a gold mine of food! He wasted no time grabbing stuff off of shelves. Pocky boxes, bananas, carrots, a big cake, a box of fruit snacks, milk, cookies, ice cream, apples, bread, peanut butter, nutella, crackers, etc. He took so much he had to create a bag from scratch so he could put it all in there.

"Hey! You need to pay for all that!" One store employee roared, but Zenjin ignored him. He did, however, snap his fingers and teleport away so the angry man wouldn't catch him. He teleported back to the fortress to put everything away. He put all the cold stuff in the freezer and refrigerator first. He took a big bite of a loaf of Italian bread he stole before teleporting back to Earth.

"People are so dumb," Zenjin said while huge chunks of bread are still in his mouth, waiting to be chewed and swallowed. After walking a little, he noticed both of his pockets were glowing. Green and silver lights shined from his pockets. He pulled them out and found that the lights were coming from the Heart Lighters. Perhaps they found people whose hearts they resonate with.

Just then, a mousy young girl of about thirteen passed by, barely noticing him. The girl's hair was black like a raven's wing, and she had blue green eyes clearer than a pond. On her back was a slightly tattered pink book bag with lots of hearts on it in many bright colors, and she was wearing a medium length brown skirt, a green jacket, and a dirty gray shirt underneath. On her feet were dirty white and red sneakers. The soles had large holes on them, making it easy for things like rocks and gravel to get trapped inside. The girl looked around nervously before turning a corner.

The green Heart Lighter flashed brighter when she passed. That told Zenjin all he needed to know. He secretly decided to follow her. The mousy young girl arrived in front of a plan looking brick building. She went inside and found herself in a room full of dingy beds covered with white pillows and dark blue sheets. People bustled to and fro from bed to bed, or inside and out. Soon, the girl saw another girl, far older than she, and ran toward her.

The older girl sat on a bed blearily. Her brown eyes were very listless and had no shine to them. Her long black hair, tied into long pigtails, was scraggly and unkempt, and it had a slight odor to it. The older girl was wearing a maroon shirt, slightly tattered blue jeans, dirty white and black sneakers, and a gray bandana round her neck. A bandage was wrapped around her left arm.

"Sorane!" The younger girl cried out as she ran to the older girl.

Sorane was met with a bright face, but her own face was anything but. "Hey, Umi. How was school?" She asked in a raspy voice. She sounded like she hadn't had anything to drink in weeks.

"It actually went great! I got a B on a math test! Wanna see? Aiko-chan helped me study and-" Umi rummaged through her bag to pull out her test, but Sorane cut her off.

"Umi. I'm not in the mood. I've been out all day trying to find a job with no luck," Sorane hissed irritably, stopping Umi from showing her her test.

Umi's smile faded. "What happened to your other one?"

Sorane glared at her angrily. "They fired me!"

"How come?"

"How should I know?! That stupid manager didn't tell me!" Umi flinched, like she was being slapped.

"Y-Y-You'll find another one soon! There's gotta be something out there! Maybe I can help you look?" Umi stammered nervously, trying to keep a brave face.

Sorane grumbled before getting out of the bed. "It's fine. They at least gave us money for food, so let's go to Giant Falcon and get some. Take your stuff with you. Yet another one of my shirts got stolen! But heaven forbid anyone does anything about it! Ugh!" Sorane complained before going out. Umi stood there for a while before following her. Her older sister was never this grouchy and irritated before.

As they walked, Umi watched as Sorane walked next to her. The air around her was tense, and the bags under her eyes didn't help. In fact, just being next to Sorane made Umi feel uneasy, and she never felt this way around her older sister before. Sorane was always warm, kind, and friendly toward everyone, and whenever Umi had a problem, she always went to Sorane for help, even if she herself had a bad day.

Now, those times were gone, and ever since that awful day, Sorane hardly ever smiled. But Umi still believed Sorane could smile again. An idea flashed in her head. "Hey, Oneechan! I was in the computer lab at school today, and I found some really funny jokes! Wanna hear them?"

Sorane said nothing, but Umi decided to crack a few, just to see if Sorane would laugh. Hopefully this would break the tension between them. "What has one head, one foot, and four legs?"

Silence. "A bed! Next one! Did you hear about the joke on the roof?"

Silence. "Never mind! It's over your head! I love that one! Oh! Here's a good one! What do you call an underwater spy? Take a guess!"

Sorane glared at her, but Umi didn't notice. "James Pond! Get it? Pond?"

"Do I look like I'm in the mood for lame jokes, Umi?!" Sorane snapped. Umi flinched and turned her head away to avoid looking at her angry face.

"No..."

Sorane handed her a 1000 yen bill. "Use this for food only! No stuffed animals, no useless trinkets, nothing that'll end up getting stolen by God knows who!"

Although Umi found herself shaking with fright, she did manage to choke out, "You don't have to be so snippy!"

"I wouldn't be snippy if you got a reality check! Come on!" Sorane hissed before stomping off.

Umi's face burned. _'Do you really think I don't know how bad our situation is?'_ Umi clutched one of the straps on her schoolbag tightly. She looked up, hoping to see the bright sun shining down on them, cheering her up, reassuring her that things will get better.

Sadly, the sky was covered with thick, gray clouds, and they certainly weren't the embodiment of hope and happiness. But Umi did see some little birds fly around singing their little songs happily. She was about to tell Sorane, since she knew her older sister loved birds, but refrained from doing so. Sorane was in a sour mood, and Umi didn't want to make her yell again. Her friends at school always loved it when she told jokes and pointed things out around the school, and they still do.

What happened to the old Sorane? The nice Sorane?

The two sisters made it to Giant Falcon without a hitch and began browsing through the aisles. Sorane grabbed a hand basket and grabbed some things off the shelves, such as apples, bananas, some bottles of water, and soap. They passed through some other sections, but didn't buy anything from them. Umi noticed some Pretty Cure toys sitting on some shelves. She remembered the days when she and Sorane would play with their own toys and make up their own Pretty Cure episodes and storylines, sitting in the living room with the fireplace lit up while their father sat in the living room watching the news.

Umi even remembered the times when she would bring her Pretty Cure toys to school and she and her friends would get together and engage in Pretty Cure play fighting with them. She never did forget that one time the toys were confiscated by their teacher in 3rd grade and she and her friends got scolded for it. She never again brought her Pretty Cure toys to school. But Umi did remember pretending to be a fish themed Pretty Cure. She would dress up in green and blue costumes, name herself Cure Fish, and fly all over the place, pretending to fight monsters and evil villains while everyone around her laughed.

Good times. But Umi knew she couldn't stay in this section for long, so she stayed with Sorane. No toys or dolls. That was Sorane's rule. She didn't want to break it, and she especially didn't want Sorane to be mad again. Sorane was mad enough due to people stealing some of her stuff, getting laid off, among other things.

Umi's stomach growled. Umi put a hand on it, but it was so loud, it caught her sister's attention. Sorane gave her a soft look and said in a sad voice, "Sorry, Umi. Once we pay for all this, you can have some food."

"It's okay! I'm not that hungry!" Umi chirped sweetly. But her stomach said otherwise. It must be confessed that Umi was indeed hungry. She hadn't eaten since lunch, and that was at school. She thanked her lucky stars that the food at school was free, and she didn't have to pay for any lunch.

"But you should at least get something. You have the 1000 yen I gave you, right? Use it, just so long as it isn't something that'll rot," Sorane told her in a kinder voice this time.

"It's fine! I'll manage! Hehe!" Umi laughed.

"Don't say I didn't warn you," Sorane pulled a jar of peanut butter off the shelf.

But as the two starving sisters got to another aisle, Umi saw a woman and her young daughter standing around. The woman was frantic with wide, shocked eyes, looking all around her coat pockets. The two of them were also in rags and tatters, like Umi and Sorane. "Where is it?! Where is it?! Where's the money?!" The woman wailed, hysterically rummaging through every single pocket she had. No trace of money. Not even a single yen.

The little four year old girl pulled on her mother's jeans. "Mommy. I'm hungry..." Her voice was raspy, like she hadn't had anything to drink in a while.

The ragged, exhausted mother fell to her knees and cried into her hands. Umi's heart went out to the mother-child duo. As hungry as Umi was, the little girl's stomach growled even louder than hers did. She wished she could do something for them. But what could she do? Umi and Sorane were in the same position, only Sorane had money left over from her last job.

Money? That's it! Umi yanked out the 1000 yen bill and walked over to the mother and daughter. "What happened? Is something wrong?" Umi asked softly.

The woman hastily rubbed her eyes with her sleeve. "I had 1000 yen, but I must have dropped it! Mimi's hungry."

"Here you go!" With a warm smile, Umi handed the 1000 yen to the mother. "It's not the one you lost, but every little bit helps, right?"

The mother was beside herself with surprise. She took the 1000 yen bill gently. "But...you're like us, aren't you?"

"It's okay! Your daughter needs food more than I do."

Some tears trickled out of the mother's eyes. Mimi smiled. "She's a nice lady!"

"Yes. Yes she is. Thank you, dearie. You have no idea how much this means to us," The mother told her kindly, in a choked voice.

Umi smiled. "You're welcome!"

"Shankuu!" Mimi chirped, waving her chubby hand at Umi.

"You be nice to your mom. Okay?"

Mimi's smile was bright like a sunflower. Mimi nodded. The mother took Mimi's hand. "Come on, sweetie. Let's go get something nice to eat."

"Okay!" With that, the mother and daughter duo went down another aisle. "Bye bye!"

Sorane and many other people watched the scene with interested eyes. Some people began talking amongst themselves. Quite favorably, too.

"Awww, that was so sweet of her!"

"I wish my kids behaved like that."

"Most people wouldn't even notice."

"What a nice girl!"

"See, Takeru? That girl did a nice thing. Isn't that great?"

"She could have just ignored her. She didn't."

"I should follow her example."

"Where's that woman at? Maybe I can help out a little."

However, even though the customers were quite pleased with Umi's kind gesture, Sorane's face was burning. Not with pleasure, but with anger. Sorane's brown eyes squinted and her face turned hard. She stomped toward Umi and took her by the shoulders, forcefully turning her around. "Umi! What were you thinking?! You just gave some of our hard earned money to some stranger?!"

"She needed it more than us! Her daughter was hungry!" Umi snapped, completely flabbergasted.

"That was OUR money! We use it for ourselves! You can't just go around giving it to people willy nilly!"

"You're the one always yelling at me about doing nice things for people! What's wrong with wanting to make someone happy?!"

"Ugh!" Sorane brushed her hands through her scraggly black hair in frustration. "When are you gonna get it?! Being nice isn't going to magically bring Mom and Dad back or make everything better!"

Something snapped inside Umi. She balled her fists, stomped her foot once, and found herself glaring at her frustrated older sister angrily before shouting, "Don't you think I know that?! I know Mom and Dad aren't coming back! I'm not stupid! But I like being nice and making people happy! What happened to you, Neechan?! Every time I do something nice for you or someone else, you always get mad and act like I committed a crime! You never even smile anymore!" Umi cried. She didn't care that people were watching. Let them watch!

Sorane found herself speechless. Some customers stopped to watch the scene, wondering just what was going on. Others had their hands over their mouths, whispering. Sorane's face burned. Umi paid absolutely no heed. "Umi. Don't start. There are people watching-"

"I know how hard things are! I get that! But you're the one that told me that being nice is a good thing, no matter how hard things get! Now you're always mad, mad, mad, and I'm sick of it! I don't like seeing you miserable! I just wanna-"

_SLAP!_ A blow to Umi's face made her stop shouting. Some customers gasped. Others covered their mouths or just went about their business. Sorane's hand was raised in the air, and the older girl herself was glaring sternly at a now tearful Umi, like she was scolding a naughty child.

One woman suddenly bolted onto the scene. "What in the world did you do that for?! That is no way to treat your sister, ma'am!"

As soon as the woman spoke, Sorane's stern look faded. Umi's face stung, even more so with the tears trickling against the inflamed cheek, exacerbating the pain. "Umi...I'm sorry..."

"No you're not!" Umi cried. "You're not the big sister I know and love!"

With that hurtful piece of rhetoric, Umi bolted out of the store. Sorane dropped her basket, and the contents spilled right out. "Umi! Umi! Wait!" Sorane chased after her sister, but Umi managed to outrun her long after they ran out of the store.

Sorane looked all over for Umi. But she didn't turn up. Soon, her legs throbbed from too much walking. She slumped against a brick house and fell to the ground, her chest heaving. She looked down and noticed she had an apple in her hand. She must have taken it from the store by accident. Her stomach churned, begging for food. Oh well. Sorane chomped on the apple.

Once she finished, she threw the core in a nearby trash can. She looked up at the sky and remembered the days she and Umi once had a home. A family. Warm meals to consume, a comfortable bed to sleep in, nice clothes to wear, friends to hang out with, a school she went to in order to learn things.

She had plans. Big plans for her life. She missed her white and black bird themed bed, her computer, her mother and father's warm, smiling faces, the warm, home cooked meals they would make, the dresses she would wear at formal dances at school like the spring formal or junior prom, the friends she made in school, and watching the birds eating from the bird feeder in the backyard, like cardinals, robins, blue jays, black birds, etc.

A flash of silver appeared from underneath her bandana. Sorane pulled it out, revealing a small, shiny, silver bird shaped necklace. The bird had its wings open and outstretched, looking ready to fly. Sorane's eyesight began to blur. Her face was already hot through being in the outdoors too much and from yelling at Umi. Some tears plopped onto the pretty necklace. "Mom...Dad…" She found herself walking down memory lane, and these were memories that changed everything.

(flashback)

_In homeroom, just before the bell was about to ring, Sorane put some of her school books back in her dark blue tote bag. Said tote bag has a picture of a white dove on it. Sorane herself wawearing a pretty pale pink long sleeved shirt that hadblack bird silhouettes all over it, aqua blue jean pants, brown boots, and her silver bird necklace around her neck. Holding her pigtails up were white, fluffy feather accessories. She happily put some of her school books away when two other girls approached her._

"_Hey, Sora-chan! Have you decided which colleges you're gonna apply to yet?" A blonde haired girl asked._

"_I'm gonna try the Radiance School of the Arts! They put on such awesome plays!" A brown haired girl exclaimed cheerfully._

"_I have a few schools in mind. I really want to go to the Lumiere Brilliante college. They have classes on ornithology," Sorane told them sweetly._

"_That's the study of birds, right?" The blonde girl asked._

"_Yep! They also have animal study classes as well. If I can't get in there, there's always other schools," Sorane added._

"_Getting into college sure isn't easy. I have to get at least five letters of recommendation from teachers and write essays for different colleges! And the worst part is, they leave you hanging sometimes, which automatically means you don't get accepted. It's like trying to get a toy in a UFO catcher game!" The brown haired girl exclaimed._

"_I know, right?" The blonde haired girl agreed. "They always make it so complicated! I wish things would be simpler, that way things could just get done and over with. Besides, I want to spend my summer having fun! I don't get to spend as much time with my boyfriend as I used to!"_

"_Does he plan on going to college?" Sorane asked._

"_Yeah. He wants to go to a medical school so he can be an EMT, but I'm sticking to a psychology major. Did you know psychology one of the most popular high school classes in the world? Lots of people take it, even in here!" The blonde girl replied._

"_Ugh! Psychology fries my brain!" The brown haired girl joked, which made Sorane and the blonde girl laugh. With that, the bell rang all throughout the school, prompting everyone to leave the building and get on the buses. Sorane, the blonde girl, and the brown haired girl continued their chatter on the bus, having a merry and jolly time._

"_My brother's having a party tonight. He, like, totally has the hots for you!" The brown haired girl piped in._

_Sorane blushed. "No way. Why would your brother like someone like me?"_

_The blonde girl elbowed her. "Because you're smart, girl! Don't worry. He's not one of those skeevy guys who hooks up with every girl he meets. He's super sweet," She added._

"_You really shouldn't be down on yourself, Sora-chan! Try to be more confident! I'm sure guys will be all over you!" The brown haired girl told her reassuringly._

"_Easy for you to say, Erika," Sorane told her friend, Erika, modestly._

"_Hey! Tsubomi-chan! Did Kazuki finally ask you out?" Erika asked the blonde girl, Sonoko._

"_No, and I'm happy about that. He's just not my type. I prefer a guy who's nice, kind, hardworking, and understanding. He's just a lazy bum," Tsubomi replied pertly._

"_I'm sure he has his good and bad points, like everyone does," Sorane said. "We should probably focus more on making our college essays."_

"_Those are so hard! I have to be all articulate and wordy, and I'm just not good at writing essays! My parents never went to college before, so I can't ask them for help," Erika piped in._

_The car ride went on for quite a while, with some stops along the way. But some blue and red flashes caught Tsubomi's eye._

"_Hey, Sorane?"_

"_Hm?"_

"_Isn't that your house right there?" Tsubomi pointed to the window. "There's a bunch of cop cars out there."_

"_What?!" Sorane yelped as she stormed to the window. Erika turned to look out there as well._

"_Whoa! You're right! There's an ambulance too!" Erika exclaimed._

_Cop cars. An ambulance. In front of her house. Some neighbors were watching from the other side of the street, whispering to themselves, wondering what was going on. Something must have happened. There was no other reason for an ambulance and cop cars being there. Without saying goodbye to her friends, Sorane stormed off the bus. _

"_Hey! Sorane!" Erika called out, but Sorane paid her no heed._

_This had to be a dream. It just had to be. There was no way cop cars and an ambulance could be in front of her house. She caught up to the cop cars and saw some paramedics carrying a gurney out of the house. The person in it was completely covered with a white sheet._

_Umi was sitting on the grass, with her face buried in her hands. A female officer was rubbing her back with a sad expression, trying to comfort her to no avail. "Umi!"_

_As soon as she heard Sorane's voice, Umi bolted up from the grass and leaped on her sister, her red face drowning in tears. "NEECHAAAAN!"_

_"What in the world is going on here?" Sorane was quick to embrace her sister and stroke her back, but it did nothing to console the crying girl._

_Umi was crying so much she couldn't get two words out. The female police officer who was consoling her decided to speak for her. "Are you her sister?"_

_"Yes. I am. What's going on here? What happened?"_

_The police officer looked down, with a grim expression. Sorane could tell something was very wrong. "What is it?! Answer me!"_

_"Your parents...they..." The words were just too hard to say. But she knew she had to. "Some burglars broke into your house. Your parents tried to fight them off, but...I'm sorry. They're gone."_

_As soon as those final words seeped into Sorane's ears, she took a few steps back. Her legs buckled and she fell to her knees, taking the still sobbing Umi down with her. Her tote bag toppled over a bit, causing some of her schoolbooks to come tumbling out._

_"They're...dead?" The words sounded like something out of a bad after school grown up movie._

_The officer nodded._

_This had to be a dream. But her parents? Dead? Killed by some thieves who wanted something in their house? Earlier, Sorane felt like she could soar through the skies. But now, she felt like her wings got cruelly clipped by lots of scissors, causing her to crash right down to the ground, keeping her on the concrete. Her eyesight blurred, and warm tears streamed right down her cheeks. Some whimpers escaped from her mouth, which suddenly evolved into full on wails. _

_The police officer's heart went out to her. She wished he could make this whole thing not be true. No kid deserved to have their parents die, especially in circumstances like this. All she could do was put a hand on her shoulder and let her cry out in grief. It went on for quite a while, even after the ambulance left. After she calmed down a bit, the officer had to ask her one thing._

"_Do you have any...other family?" The officer asked._

_Sorane wiped her eyes with her hands before answering. "We...We don't know..."_

"_I see. The foster care system will try to find any relatives you can stay with," She hoped to reassure the crying girls, but they could tell she sounded doubtful._

_"Mom...Dad..." Umi left huge tear marks on Sorane's shirt. "Neechan..." The older girl hugged her sister tighter. She wished she could make this all not be true. Umi didn't deserve to go through this. But there was nothing she could do._

_With only her school books, her tote bag, and the clothes on her back, she slept in a private room at the police station with Umi. Both girls were left alone to deal with their grief and sadness. At one point, Umi woke up a screaming mess. She flailed her arms around and kicked her legs up and down, smacking the bed beneath her. It took Sorane at least half an hour to console her and calm her down. She prayed that something good would happen._

'Please, God...please...' _Sorane prayed with all her heart._

_But tomorrow would turn out to be worse. As it turned out, because Sorane was eighteen years old, she was deemed too old to be in the foster care system. It didn't help that she had no other family members to take her in. As a result, she and Umi were turned away, with Sorane being told to go get a job and make her own living._

_Sorane thought her world had been shattered before, but all the remaining pieces of it were ground into dust. What could she do now?_

(end flashback)

"Now I know...this is what being homeless is like…" Sorane muttered to herself. She had seen some homeless people hanging around her neighborhood whenever her parents would take her on car rides. She even volunteered at some homeless shelters in high school. As happy as she felt about being able to help some homeless people, she didn't think she would live the kind of lives they lived. But now...her old life seemed like a dream, a dream she thought she had been sleeping in for years, like she never lived that kind of happy life in the first place.

* * *

Umi found a bench somewhere nearby and sat down, her chest heaving from too much running, her face burning with heat. Her stomach growled once more, screaming for food. She saw a grumpy man throw something in the trash. On impulse, she found herself running toward the trash can. As much as she hated digging through trash cans, she knew she had to eat something or she would keel over.

She pulled out a meatball sub with one piece eaten off. Scooping the sub in her hands, Umi ran to the nearest tree and ate it in hiding. She couldn't bear having someone watch her do something so undignified. She made sure to check for dirt, bugs, or other contaminants. She didn't want to eat anything that was dirty or infested with bugs. Thankfully, the sub was clean. Her nostrils quivered at the warm aroma of the sauce on the meatballs, and her hands were warmed by the soft bread. She was quick to chomp off a huge piece, cramming it into her mouth, lost in its warmth. Already she could feel her stomach being satisfied with its newly consumed meal with every bite.

For a moment, she found herself hugging the now half eaten meatball sub like it was a cherished stuffed animal. Her weak legs were trembling and her hands clutched the wrapping around the meatball sub tightly. She always took food for granted. Her house always had plenty of it, and she was always quick to grab the nearest cookie or taiyaki, much to Sorane's consternation. There was never a day when she didn't eat more than she should have. But now, she could barely get enough for lunch, and today wasn't the first time she went without breakfast, either.

"I don't want to live like this anymore..." Umi mused. Her eyesight blurred and her eyes became wet with tears. "Why can't things...go back to the way they were before?"

Umi wanted it all back. Her nice house, her nice room, her kind parents, her kind older sister, her nice clothes, the warm dinners her parents would make every day, the cold showers she would take, her favorite turquoise shampoo, the scented jasmine candles her mother would buy every time they went to Osaka Candle. She even missed the days where she got scolded by her mother for not paying attention in class or bringing back some bad grades because she failed to do her homework some of the time. At this point, Umi considered school to be a luxury now, and it wasn't easy paying attention and getting better grades this time around. Studying proved to be easier and nicer than living on the streets, with people staring at her, marveling at her dirty clothes, her messy hair, and lack of hygiene.

Not once did she ever think she would live this kind of life. It was too different from what she was used to. She was sure Sorane thought the same thing. But boy, did she try to take it in stride! She tried to smile in the face of her new situation, ignore the pitiful looks people gave her, treasure any and all food they rarely got, think positive thoughts, be kind to others like she always was, do the best she could at school, throw herself in her studies far more than she usually did, and be happy with what they could have. Umi wasn't sure how she managed to come this far with little food, clothes, and no showers in a long while. There were times when she spent days without food because she gave her own food and money to those who needed it more than she. She tried so hard to get through every day with a smile on her face. But today, she just wasn't feeling it. She wasn't sure if she could go on like this any longer.

"Mom...Dad...why'd you have to die..." Some warm tears trickled out of Umi's bluish green eyes, dripping into what was left of the meatball sub. But she knew she needed to eat or else a bad way would get worse, so she tried to get back to eating it.

She remembered a book a classmate showed her once when she was younger. A Little Princess, was it? That was about Sara Crewe, a rich girl who became poor when her father died, and the evil headmistress of the school made her into a servant who lived in the attic, wore drab clothes, and was hated by the other students. Umi admired the girl's courage and perseverance, even when it seemed absolutely hopeless. If Sara Crewe could survive being poor and hungry all the time, then why couldn't Umi? But the girl wasn't sure if she could be like Sara Crewe. Smiling and being positive didn't make her situation better. She knew that for sure. Sorane didn't need to remind her of that.

Unbeknownst to Umi, Zenjin watched her from a nearby tree. He looked down at the green perfume bottle in his hand, which glowed in a faint light. "It's reacting to her. Might as well give it to her. She ought to be easy to manipulate."

With the green bottle in his hand, he raised it up and...threw it. It flew in a round arc, and bounced on a soft bushel of grass. He proceeded to throw the silver one as well, and it landed right near the green bottle.

Rustle.

Umi turned her head around. Where did that noise come from? Zenjin was quick to stay out of her sight.

The confused girl looked down to find two star shaped perfume bottles lying a few feet away from her. Green and silver. She kneeled down to get a closer look. "Wooow. They're so pretty," Umi scooped the bottles in her arms and put them in her skirt pocket. "I ought to show these to Neechan!"

She needed to get back, so she ate some of the meatball sub and put the rest of it in her other pocket. She figured Sorane would like some, too. "Umi! Umi where are you?!"

"Over here, Sorane!"

Sorane staggered in front of Umi, her legs burning from too much running. She inhaled huge breaths, and sweat trickled down her face as she gripped her knees. "I've been...looking everywhere for you...don't...run off...like that..."

Umi looked down at her feet with a frown. The anger from before simmered away. "Sorry."

She could see a remorseful look in her big sister's eyes. "I'm the one who should be sorry. I shouldn't have yelled at you in the store, and you're right. I'm...not the same person I used to be," Sorane clenched her fist. Umi could see it trembling. "I hate being like this. I don't want to be some irritable girl who yells at people."

Umi could tell her sister was sincere, so she hugged her big sister tightly. "It's okay. I forgive you. I saved this for you," She showed her the meatball sub. Sorane didn't even ask Umi where she got it or how. Her stomach was begging for food, and she figured she might as well eat it and deal with it. She chomped the meatball sub down.

"That was good. Thank you," The growling in Sorane's stomach ceased.

Umi smiled. "You're welcome. Oh!" Umi rummaged through her pockets and pulled out the perfume bottles. "Look what I found! Aren't they pretty?"

"Huh? Where did you get those?" Sorane asked in a guarded tone. She had a feeling there was something shady about those bottles.

"I found them in the grass."

"You really shouldn't pick up random items off the street. Who knows what germs might be crawling around on them...and why is that green one glowing?"

As soon as Sorane said that, a white light appeared in the silver bottle. "Whoa! That one's glowing, too!"

"Let's open them and see!"

"Umi! Wait!"

Umi didn't listen and immediately undid the cap on the green bottle before handing Sorane the silver bottle. Sorane opened hers, too. The lights inside the bottles flew into their hands, each turning into small jewels. The bottles themselves glowed radiantly for a few seconds before they ceased, revealing hollow cavities in the glass. The jewel in Umi's hand was a dark green heart with a light green fish in the middle, whereas Sorane's was also heart shaped, but white with a set of silver wings on it, both outstretched and ready to fly.

"What in the world?!" Sorane found herself wide eyed. "This can't be real!"

"Wow! These are pretty! Maybe these are magical girl items!"

"Come on, Umi! There's no such thing as magic!" Sorane argued. But her insides were doing backflips. _'But these bottles glowed. That's not something you see every day. Just what is going on here?!'_

Without warning, the heart shaped jewels floated out of their hands and fit themselves into the cavities in the perfume bottles. Tornadoes of light suddenly swallowed them up, trapping them inside.

"Pretty Cure, let the light shine!"

After a while, the tornadoes of light dissipated, and out came the two girls, now looking very different. Sorane now had periwinkle hair, with a white feather decoration sticking out of it, with other ones holding up her long pigtails. She had silver, bird-shaped earrings, a matching shirt with a white ruffle going right down it vertically with bird buttons going down it, and a white ribbon on her chest with a silver bird clip on it. She was also wearing light grey shorts, black leggings, and white shoes with silver bird jewels on each one. Both shoes had little wings on them. Around her waist was a black belt with a white bird jewel on it, with a tail protruding out from it. On her back were large snow white wings, like those of a swan. She had fingerless white gloves along with a silver bird jewel on her right forearm, just beneath her glove.

"I am the light whose wings radiate the sky! Cure Skylight!" Sorane-now Cure Skylight-proclaimed with her wings outstretched.

Umi's hair had turned green, with a lighter green shirt that had a white ruffle going down it with darker fish shaped buttons on it. On her chest was a ribbon with a bluish green, fish shaped clip attached to it. In her hair was a large, frilly white ribbon. She was wearing green pants, and wrapped around her waist was a large, bluish green shawl like cloth with pockets on it, going down past her knees, with the back of it cut to look like a fish's tail. On her arms were long, pale, fingerless gloves that looked like detached sleeves, with little fish fins dangling from her wrists. She was wearing light green shoes with fish marks on them in a darker shade, both of which had small fish fins on them. On her left ankle was a green jewel shaped like a fish.

"I am the light sparkles on the ocean waves! Cure Sealight!" Umi-now Cure Sealight-exclaimed happily.

"Together, we are Pretty Cure!" The two newborn superheroes exclaimed in perfect unison.

"Wait...WHAT?! What the freak is this?!" Sorane yelped, taking note of her new transformation. "Cure Skylight?! Purikura?! What?! Is this some kind of sick joke?! What happened to me?!"

Umi, however, had a different reaction. "Wow! I look like a magical girl superhero! Awesome! We can save people and fight crime!" Umi jumped up and down, her joy bubbling over. Her hair and fish fins bounced joyfully with every jump.

"Why do I have wings?! I have GOT to be dreaming! Somebody tell me I'm dreaming!"

Sealight wasted no time pinching Skylight's cheek and pulling on it quite hard. "Owwww!"

"Nope, you're not dreaming, Neechan," Sealight deadpanned.

A red mark appeared on Skylight's cheek. "This is soooo weird. Where did this even come from?! Why do we even look like this?! Umi! I told you you shouldn't have picked up those weird perfume bottles, but did you listen to me?! Noooo!"

Ignoring her protests and sisterly nagging, Sealight grabbed Skylight's hand. "Come on! Let's go somewhere and practice using our new powers! This'll be great! We can be magical girls who fight crime and save the town from evil doers! But we can't fight crime if we don't know how to use our powers!"

"Umi! Don't be ridiculous! Magical girls aren't real!"

"But we transformed just now, didn't we?"

"How do we change back?!"

Sealight facepalmed. And to think Sorane thought Umi was the troublesome one most of the time. "Quit whining! Let's go do some magical girl training! And I know the perfect place to do it!" Sealight grabbed Skylight's arm and dragged her away from the area.

"Umiiiiii! We shouldn't be messing around with strange stuuuuuuff!" Skylight whined as she and her younger sister disappeared.

Unbeknownst to them, Zenjin watched them with a watchful eye. "This ought to be easy as pie."

* * *

Day after day, Marina began to enjoy having Chinami as a band partner. Every day they'd stay after school in band class, practicing their drums, and if they have extra time, play songs from their own little mini band. At this point, Marina's band is in its infancy, but Marina sings and plays the guitar while Chinami plays drums. At this point, the summer heat began to beat down on the neighborhood, but life at school began to improve quite drastically for everyone. Yoshie has been absent from school a lot, Toshiko joined the fashion club, Shizuka and Fukiko have bonded over the cute boys in Fukiko's issues of Kira*Kira Smile, and people are actually noticing Marina, Riko, and Anzu's good qualities.

One day, Riko wrote a little strip featuring Twilight Cat, and some girls in class happened to notice. "Wow! Did you seriously draw that, Tasogare-san?"

Riko blushed a bit. "Y-Y-Yeah. It's not that good-"

"Hey! Come see this! Riko's an amazing artist!" The girl named Yuuka shouted, prompting everyone to gather around and be awestruck by her comic strip.

"Aww, that's so cute!"

"You draw way better than I do."

"I wish our school had a newspaper. You could publish it."

"Did you make those characters up?"

"You're awesome at drawing!"

"Yeah she's awesome!" Marina added as she patted Riko on the back. "If you ask me, she's the best artist in the whole school!"

"Mari-chan, don't say stuff like that. An-chan's a better artist than me," Riko told her sheepishly.

"Don't be so modest, Riko! You should be proud of your talents!" Kyoya piped in.

"She's right," Anzu added with a smile. "Everyone has different talents that they should be proud of. My dad says that every person is different and unique, and that's a good thing because it'd be boring if everybody was the same all the time."

Sometimes after school, Marina and Chinami's musical prowess would be praised and ogled over by the kids and teachers, claiming they should get scouted by some big music-themed production company. At first, Marina thought all the praise was fabricated, but she could see the twinkles in their eyes, the genuine awe at her talents. _'Is this what it's like to be popular?'_ Marina thought. She didn't think the day would ever come, but it did.

Later on, Marina and Chinami put on a little mini concert while Riko, Kyoya, Anzu, Fukiko, Hotaru, and the fairies, who remained in stuffed animal mode, all watched in awe as the duo really seemed to be in sync with each other. They sang their hearts out to their attentive audience.

"_You may say I'm a fool,_

_With this attitude I have,_

_But I can't live my life all gloomy and sad,_

_For there's too much good in the world,_

_And that's why I keep walking on this road,_

_Because my friends are waiting for me there!"_

With a final strum of the guitar strings and beat of the drum, their newly written song ended, and claps and cheers echoed throughout the park. "That was great, you guys!" Riko chirped happily-she's the only one who's not clapping.

"You guys are gonna be famous someday, I know it," Hotaru told them kindly with a sweet smile lighting it up quite a bit.

"Play it again!" Kyoya exclaimed.

"Are you gonna write more songs?" Fukiko asked.

"We'll need to get our band off the ground first before we do anything. But thanks!" Marina chirped as Chinami flashed a smile at her. Lights of warmth enveloped all of their hearts, continuing to shine like stars in the night sky.


	32. Sealight and Skylight

Chapter 30: Cure Sealight and Skylight's First Battle!

"Come on, Skylight! Flap your wings harder!" Cure Sealight yelled, swimming gracefully in a nearby lake, watching as Cure Skylight struggled to keep herself aloft.

"I'm...trying..." Her wings suddenly ached, and she found herself falling. "YEEEEEEEEEK!" With that, she crashed into a nearby tree before landing on the ground. Leaves fluttered down to accompany her, but to Sorane, they were of no consolation.

"You okay?" Sealight shouted from the water.

"Do I LOOK like I'm okay to you?!"

Sealight recoiled and retreated by diving into the water. She accepted her new powers right off, and used them much more often than Sorane. Again, for Umi, being under the water, swimming with the schools of fish, was like a dream come true. No, her dream had already come true. Umi swam both above the water and underneath, surprised at the fact that she could breathe underwater. Some schools of fish swam away as soon as they saw the green girl approaching them at mach speed, but she didn't care. Umi felt at peace under the water, like she really could take on the world. Umi swam to her heart's content, like she was meant to live under the sea rather than on the surface. Under the water, Umi's troubles disappeared, like they never existed.

Skylight pulled herself back up, wiping some leaves and twigs off of herself. "Urgh...this is so weird..." She extended one of her wings to look at it. "I have wings and magical powers now? Well, I know I'm not dreaming, that's for sure."

As confused as Cure Skylight was, in her heart, she was internally screaming like a little girl, happy to suddenly grow wings and be able to fly just like the birds she always loved watching and studying. She always marveled at the little birds twittering their lovely songs, soaring in the skies to their heart's content. Skylight always wished she could fly like a bird. Now, her dream seemed to come true.

If only she could get the hang of flying, first!

"Alright then. Let's try this again," Skylight flapped her wings and ran across the meadow before leaping into the air, her wings riding on the wind. She flapped them as much as she could like Sealight told her to. Much to her surprise, she was finally aloft for once, and she didn't fall!

"Wow...this is awesome!" The vast sky, the wind caressing her hair, the feeling of being in the air...it felt so revitalizing to Skylight. In fact, she wanted to try flying some more! A wide smile appeared on her face, the wind and sky erasing all her doubts.

She thought she was dreaming, but she wasn't. She was far above the ground, everything below her looked a lot smaller than before, and the snow white, swan like wings on her back were real, taking her farther and farther into the sky. Sorane found herself loving every minute of this: the gentle breeze on her face, her hair swaying in the wind, being able to do all kinds of tricks like spinning around, doing back flips, diving near the water before zooming right back up again. To the skeptical and cautious Sorane, this was a dream come true. She felt like she could take on the world again.

"You're flying, Neechan!" Sealight shouted, sticking her head out from the water. "You're really flying!"

"I'm flying...I'm flying! Woohooooooo!"

"Wait! Sorane! Look out-"

"OOF!"

Sorane crashed right into a nearby tree, and she fluttered to the ground like a dead bird. "Neechan!" Sealight pulled herself out of the water and ran to her fallen sister. "Neechan! Are you okay?!" She hoped she wasn't dead. Please let her not be dead. Umi already lost her parents. She didn't want to lose her sister.

Thankfully, a cough and a groan dispelled all of Sealight's doubts. Skylight sat up and brushed some blades of grass out of her hair. "Ugh! I can't even look where I'm going!" Skylight whined.

"You're getting better!" Sealight mused happily, relieved that her big sister wasn't dead. But she noticed some lacerations on Skylight's arm and left leg. All of a sudden, some words flowed into Sealight's mind.

She spun around once, and a ring of water swirled around her. "Sealight..." She extended her hands out toward Skylight, and the ring of water floated toward Skylight, encasing her in a ripply sphere. "...Aqua Ring!"

"What the-?!" Skylight squeezed her eyes shut, afraid that Sealight might be attacking her. But much to her surprise, the pain in her arm and leg was disappearing. She opened her eyes and saw that the lacerations were gone. The water sphere dissipated.

"Wow! I have healing powers, too! This is awesome!" Sealight squealed as she jumped up and down.

"Umi! For a moment I thought you were attacking me!"

"Sorry! I couldn't help it! My body just moved on its own!"

"Quit making excuses!"

"I'm not lying!"

Skylight facepalmed. She wished she hadn't said that, especially since Sealight healed her injuries. "Thanks for helping me."

"You're welcome," A light bulb flashed in Sealight's head. Her smile turned radiant and her eyes glistened with joy. "Hey! Now that we've managed to hone our superpowers a bit, we can go out into the world and save people and fight crime!"

Skylight wiped some blades of grass out of her wings. "Huh?"

"It'll be so much fun! Just think of all the people we could save!" Sealight grabbed one of Skylight's arms and pulled her away. She didn't realize that she was pulling so hard that Skylight's arm was hurting. "Let's go and fight some bank robbers right now!"

Skylight managed to pull her hand out of Sealight's. "Hold your horses, Umi. I don't think that's such a good idea."

Sealight tilted her head to one side, raising an eyebrow. "Why not?"

"I know how reckless you can be sometimes. If you're not careful with your powers, you could hurt someone by accident or even kill them. This isn't an anime, y'know."

"I can be careful! I've practiced the whole time!"

Skylight sighed. "Umi. I don't think we should do this. We'd attract too much unwanted attention, and I don't want you to throw yourself in danger."

"Come on, Sorane! We have superpowers now! We could be unstoppable! We can be heroes and save the world and everybody will love us-"

Skylight stamped her foot once. "Umi!" Sorane's loud voice made Umi flinch. "You are NOT going to masquerade around with those powers and that is final, young lady!"

"Why not?!" Sealight snapped back. "We could help people!"

"That's not the issue here! You can't keep a leash on yourself for the life of you! You'd just make a huge mess of things like you always do, and you get distracted too easily!"

"No I don't! Not anymore! Stop being such a scrooge!"

"I just want to protect you!"

"More like you're convinced I'm gonna destroy the world and want to put me in a cage!"

Unbeknownst to the girls, Zenjin sat on a thick tree branch, watching them from above. He had his hand covering his mouth, stifling laughter. "Man! They're just too hilarious!" Zenjin got a real kick out of watching them fight.

"Why are you being so difficult?!"

"_You're_ the one being difficult!"

"You can't even use your powers properly!"

"I'm not the one crashing into trees and falling on the ground!"

For once, Skylight didn't contradict her on that one. Unbeknownst to them, a park ranger in uniform was scouting the area. He didn't seem to notice the two girls. Zenjin, on the other hand, did notice him, and flashed an evil smirk. Within seconds, he descended before the frazzled man, shot a red beam at him, exposed his Soul Portal, and dunked his head inside.

The man's scream echoed in the woods, sending birds flying. It also stopped the girls from arguing any further. "What was that?!" Sealight yelped.

"I don't know!"

Before they could do anything, a large, black flamingo pranced onto the area, its wings outstretched. Skylight screamed in terror and tried to flee the scene, but Sealight grabbed one of her wings. "Come on, Neechan! We're gonna fight that monster and save people!"

"I don't want to! It's too dangerous!" Skylight whined like a little kid, not the grown adult she was supposed to be. It must be confessed that Sealight expected this. She always knew Skylight talked big but was a big coward at heart.

"Fine! If you won't fight it, then I will!" Sealight called forth a wave of water and shot it at the flamingo. It didn't cause any damage, as the flamingo used one of its wings to smack the water away, but it was enough to make it stagger a little bit.

"No! Umi! Get back down here!" Skylight scolded. Sealight paid her no heed as she punched the flamingo right on the beak with her fist.

"Wow! How am I able to punch it so hard?!"

Realizing that she wouldn't listen, she groaned and decided to jump in the fray. She figured she might as well use her powers to defeat this thing, even though she has no basic knowledge of fighting. But as she threw herself in the air, she landed a kick on the bird's leg on instinct, as though she already knew how to fight. As soon as it landed, the flamingo let out a squawk and staggered to the ground.

'Whoa. Did I just kick it?' Skylight thought.

The flamingo got back up and began flying toward the neighborhood. Already, Sealight and Skylight could hear the cacophony of screams and cries. "Oh no! We can't let it get into town!" Sealight called forth a tornado of water and scurried toward the flamingo. She was quick to knock it down on the street as soon as it tried to fly again.

"Take this!" Sealight made a smaller sphere with her hands that glowed in a sea green light. "Sealight Pulse!" She threw the ball at the flamingo like it was a dodge ball. The flamingo scurried away and the pulse hit the street, but not enough to leave a pot hole.

"Umi! Be careful!" Skylight yelled as she caught up. All of a sudden, a cutlass appeared in front of her. "Whoa! Where'd this come from?!"

The flamingo wasted no time pecking at the street, prompting everyone to run for the hills, screaming for their lives. One little girl tripped and started crying. A woman screamed hysterically, fearing for her daughter's life. The flamingo caught sight of her and proceeded to try and eat her.

Skylight's eyes widened with horror. She couldn't let that little girl get eaten.

"NO!" With a great yell, Cure Skylight zipped toward the little girl and picked her up before the giant flamingo could swallow her up. "Go somewhere safe! Hurry!" Sorane told the woman as she handed her daughter to her. The mother and daughter listened and ran for the hills.

"Awesome job, Skylight!" Sealight said as it landed some kicks on the flamingo's belly.

'_I don't know if I can do this...but I have these powers now. Why not use them for good?'_ Sorane thought as she clutched her cutlass and proceeded to throw herself at the giant flamingo.

"Skyward Sword!" Cure Skylight roared as she flung her cutlass against one of the flamingo's outstretched wings, leaving a huge cut on it, rendering it unable to fly. The flamingo roared with pain as its wing was cut. This gave Sealight a chance to land some punches on both its head and back. She almost managed to knock it out had the flamingo not headbutted her sending her flying into the sidewalk.

"Umi!" Skylight was about to fly toward her but the flamingo chomped on her one wing and threw her into a tree. Skylight was quick to pull herself out and slash the flamingo's beak once.

"Skyward Scream!" Cure Skylight yelled before emitting a very loud, high pitched scream that resonated all throughout the neighborhood. Sealight had to cover her ears, not that it helped much. Thankfully for Sorane, the flamingo was now confused and wobbly, swaying back and forth.

"_I wish I could spend more time at home...with my wife and kids. They miss me! I'm sick of being at work all the time! I know I'm working for their benefit, but I want to spend time with them, too!"_ The somber voice of the flamingo bellowed before smacking Cure Skylight with its uninjured wing. She would have landed on a roof had Sealight not managed to make a bubble appear underneath her.

"I got you!" Sealight hopped on the roof and helped Skylight get down. "You okay?"

"I've been better. Umi. You need to get out of here. It's too dangerous."

"No! I'm not leaving you here! We have to fight it together!"

"No we don't, and you have to go! I'll handle this on my own!"

"Come on, Neechan! These people need us!"

Skylight could feel her face burning. "Go back to the shelter right now, young lady!"

"And let you be turned into flamingo dinner?! No!" Sealight roared before shooting another Sealight Pulse at the flamingo.

"Umi! Don't just throw magic balls so recklessly!" Skylight scolded.

"This isn't the time for that right now!"

The flamingo almost pecked them had they not managed to evade it. Sealight hopped on its neck and delivered some hard punches before hopping off. The flamingo staggered toward her. Sealight was about to use another attack, but Skylight suddenly flew in front, allowing the flamingo to headbutt her, sending them both rolling on the sidewalk.

Instead of feeling exhausted, Sealight found herself hopping mad. "Why did you do that, Skylight?!"

"That thing was about to eat you!" Skylight snapped back.

"I was going to attack it myself!"

"You could have hurt someone!"

The flamingo almost stepped on them. This time, Skylight grabbed one of its webbed feet, allowing Sealight time to escape. But this green clad girl wasn't going to flee the scene. 'Sheesh! I wish she'd stop treating me like a baby!' Sealight thought. When she looked up, she noticed something green on the black flamingo's under wing.

Green, glowing numbers. 00:45:34. 00:45:33. 00:45:32. _'Is that some kind of timer on it? Does that mean I have to defeat it within a certain amount of time?' _Sealight didn't like the implications of that. She had to defeat it. Fast. "Drowning Aquarius!" A spiral of water crashed down on the flamingo, consuming it whole. Skylight just barely managed to evade it, but not enough to prevent herself from getting soaked.

"Ugh! Umiiii! Look what you diiiiid!" Skylight whined.

"Skylight! We need to defeat it fast! There's a timer on it!" Sealight told her, pointing to the timer.

"Quit being ridiculous and cooperate for once!"

Sealight's face burned. "I'm trying to tell you something important!"

With a squawk, the flamingo almost stepped on Sealight had she not managed to roll away from it. Skylight flew upward before throwing herself at the flamingo again, with yet another attack she came up with. "Aerial Ace!" Before it could peck at anything or anyone, Sorane flew past the flamingo, knocking it over. Then she hit the flamingo in another direction, preventing it from getting up.

'_Wow! I didn't know I could fight like this! Is this thing giving me fighting skills, too? In that case...I better defeat this thing!'_ Sorane delivered a rolling kick, slamming her foot right on the flamingo's head.

"_My boss has it out for me. I know it! He makes me work so much overtime! I come home tired every day! I don't want to spend my days all tired and groggy! I want to enjoy my life and be with the people I love!"_ The flamingo bellowed sadly as it hopped all over the place. But Sorane isn't done with it yet.

Sorane closed her eyes and imagined her wings turning into steel. They did. She opened them and flew toward the flamingo with flames of courage blazing in her heart. "Steel Wing!" She threw herself against the flamingo's neck, sending it falling to the ground. But before it fell completely, it kicked Sorane with one of its legs, sending her flying into the sky a little bit. But she managed to regain her composure.

"The timer says we have forty two minutes left to defeat it! Let's hurry!" Sealight announced before sending another Sealight Pulse at the flamingo. It almost fell on top of a house, but Skylight managed to grab it by the head.

"Umi! I told you not to be reckless with your attacks!"

"I was just trying to help!"

"Get out of here! You're just making this worse!"

"No I'm not!"

The flamingo regained its balance and almost pecked Skylight, but Sealight managed to call forth a green fishing rod. She was quick to throw it, and the line wrapped right around both legs. With a great pull, she yanked on the fishing rod and the flamingo fell right on the street, evading the house. The landing made a huge pothole in the street.

"Now's your chance, Skylight!" Sealight exclaimed.

Skylight found herself dumbfounded. She was sure Sealight would get reckless with her powers and unknowingly make things worse. But...Sealight was proving to be competent. When did her little sister get to be so level headed and mature? Did she grow up before her very eyes and she didn't know it? But it didn't change the fact that Umi was still her little sister, and she couldn't let Umi throw herself in danger.

She decided to try something else. She spun around in the sky like a ballerina. "Feather Dance!" After performing some ballet-like dance moves, a blizzard of feathers rained down on the flamingo, making it sway back and forth like it was being relaxed. Time for the finishing blow. She struck some more poses, this time with a radiant white light surrounding her.

"Wings of light, give me the power to fly toward greater heights!" She called out like she was praying to God. "Skylight…" She became cloaked in a harsh white light, and the light itself formed the shape of a large bird. A phoenix, even. "...Phoenix!" Enveloped by light in the form of a bird, Cure Skylight threw herself at the giant flamingo, causing an explosion of light that covered the whole neighborhood. Finally, it dissipated, and the black flamingo was gone, leaving behind a white glass orb.

Sealight ran over to the glass orb. "Yay! We did it!" She picked it up very gingerly.

"Umi! Don't touch that!"

"Come on! We need to go put this back in that man!" Sealight reasoned as she called forth a water tornado and went back to the forest.

Skylight groaned before flying after her. "Umiiiii!" Sealight was quick to find the park ranger and gently put the glass orb back in his Soul Portal. Both items disappeared and the color returned to his skin. Umi let out an audible gasp as soon as she saw him twitch. He was alive! That was enough to have Umi let out a sigh of relief.

"Phew! We saved him!" Sealight said as soon as Cure Skylight descended behind her.

Something in Skylight's heart was stirring. In all her years of being a sister, she always had to be the one to keep Umi out of trouble and make sure she didn't say or do anything inappropriate, such as wander off on her own or accidentally break something. Sorane remembered that time Umi wandered off and she and her parents spent an hour looking for her, only to find that Umi had gone to the store all by herself to buy some bread and candy with some money she saved. Not only that, Umi's room was always covered with clothes, papers, or toys she never bothered to straighten up. There was one time Umi accidentally broke Sorane's glass bird and Sorane was so angry she not only yelled at Umi but almost hit her had her mother not stopped her.

And yet...Umi was different now. Not only did she fight that monster with everything she had, but she made sure not to break anything and didn't make a mess of things. Umi adapted to her powers better than Sorane did, she handled the situation better than she, and even saved her a few times. Umi willingly threw herself into danger for the sake of people she didn't know and for Sorane. Sorane knew she should be happy...but why wasn't she? Her sister was growing up before her very eyes. Her insides were still doing back flips and her hands were shaking.

When did Umi suddenly become so strong and brave? Stronger and braver than she?

Cure Skylight balled her fists in an attempt to stop her hands from shaking, but it didn't do any good. She gritted her teeth and her eyes squinted to control the blurring. No fair. Sorane was supposed to be the brave, strong, and competent one. She was supposed to be the one doing the saving. That was what she thought.

Before she could stop herself, she suddenly blurted out, "Why didn't you listen to me?!"

"Huh?"

"I kept telling you to let me handle it and stay out of danger, but you didn't listen to me once!" Skylight shouted, her voice going up an octave. She didn't know why she was saying these things. She should be happy for Umi, not yelling at her over something so petty!

Umi knew it, too. "I was only trying to do my duty as a magical girl hero and help people! We both saved the town, didn't we?"

"That's not the issue here, Umi! You should have ran away! You could have been killed!"

"So you wanted me to let those people die?! No way!"

"Umi! I am your big sister, and you have to-"

Oh. So that's where she was going. Umi's face turned red like a tomato. She jerked as if she was stung by a wasp, sputtering, "Stop that! I hate it when you do this! Stop treating me like a baby! I'm not the troublemaker you think I am, Sorane! I stuck my neck out there for those people! It's what heroes do!"

"You were being reckless, Umi! You could have done something stupid and gotten them or both of us killed!"

Umi squinted at Sorane. She wanted to stay calm and handle this in the most rational manner possible. But the control just wasn't there, and she tried so hard to try to understand Sorane's point of view. To be fair, Umi did cause her fair share of mishaps when she was young, partly due to her impulsivity and lack of care for the consequences when she was little. It wasn't as though she was being bad or malicious. She just got carried away and didn't think before she acted. But Umi knew better now. Sorane knew that now, and that was what bothered Umi the most.

Why couldn't Sorane acknowledge that? That was always a sore spot with Umi, even before their parents got married, and now Sorane just jabbed it with a red hot poker.

"Oh, like you're little Miss Perfect Big Sister?!" Umi shouted, stamping her foot. "You barely did a thing in that battle! All you did was run away and complain and whine until you actually got your act together! I tried to tell you about that timer thing but YOU didn't listen to ME!"

"I was just trying to make sure you didn't-"

"It's always like this! _'Umi, don't break anything! Umi, look what you did! Umi, be more careful! Umi, don't be a little brat! Umi, don't cause me trouble!'_ I'm sick of you always acting like you have to do everything for me! You may act like a big sister, but you're even worse than me!"

Sorane put her hands on her hips. "How so? Enlighten me, please!"

"I actually give people some space!" Umi barked. "I actually try to be nice to everyone and listen to them! I let them do what they want and trust them! I try to help people! I don't see you going around and doing all that, now do I?"

Sorane brushed her hands through her hair. "You do realize I'm your big sister, right?"

"Maybe I'm better off without a sister!"

If words could be arrows and pierce someone's heart, Umi's words definitely stabbed Sorane right then and there. Sorane balled her fists. Had Umi really forgotten all those times Sorane helped her on the streets? How she hugged her and let Umi cry when they found out what happened to their parents? That time Sorane beat up some bullies for picking on Umi when she was in third grade? Those times when Sorane took the blame for Umi when their parents got mad?

But what especially hurt Sorane was that...Umi was right. About everything. Sorane tried to pull her own weight during the battle, and did so, but she cared too much about keeping Umi on a leash rather than focusing on the bigger problem. She was too frustrated to even think about being calm.

"You have some nerve talking to me like that! I've been going around looking for jobs for our sake! Didn't you ever think about that?!" Sorane found herself shaking her head as she said this. This wasn't how it was supposed to go!

Umi found herself trembling with anger. "You never even smile or be happy anymore! You never even so much as notice when I do nice things for you! A good sister would notice those things and be happy!"

"Maybe I AM better off not having a sister who does nothing but stick her head in a fantasy that'll never come true!"

"I'm better off without a grumpy, grouchy, annoying big sister who treats me like a baby and a troublemaker!" Umi shoved her face toward Sorane's.

"Fine!"

"Fine!"

"FINE!" The two glared at each other before Skylight flapped her wings and soared away.

Sorane flew in the skies of the neighborhood, with no destination in particular. She didn't think she still had any energy left to fly. She floated aimlessly in the air, wishing she could turn back time. If she had these powers on that day, she would have been able to save her parents. She could have stopped those murderers from killing them, like the superheroes in the comic books do. Stupid fate. It shouldn't have to be this fickle and cruel. Finally, unable to fly anymore, Sorane floated down on one sidewalk, changing back to normal.

That's when it hit her. Did she seriously just yell at Umi? All because Umi proved herself to be a good warrior and a good sister when all Sorane did was complain, whine, and be jealous? Her eyesight began to blur, and now, with night draping its blanket on the neighborhood, she could see nothing. Sorane wailed and hit herself in the head three times.

"Aaaauuuugh! Stupid stupid stupid!" Sorane yelled, chastising herself for succumbing to her frustration _yet again_. This wasn't the kind of person she used to be. She knew that. She knew everything she said to Umi was wrong, and yet...Sorane wanted to die. "I really have turned into a horrible person!" Sorane wailed further, not caring that her face was wet with tears.

Sorane knew she normally never acted like this toward anyone, especially people like Umi. What changed her for the worse like that? Probably her current situation and the stress of taking care of Umi. But she knew it wasn't Umi's fault. Better yet, Umi was trying to be a good sister, even after their parents died. "Why do I keep making all these bad decisions? I need to stop saying stuff I don't mean!"

"Are you okay, miss?" The voice of a girl slightly younger than herself asked kindly. With a whimper, Sorane looked up to find a high school aged girl and her two male parents looking down at her with concerned, sympathetic faces. Even in the darkness of the night, Sorane could see the sympathy on their faces. But at this point, she felt she didn't deserve it. Hotaru kneeled before the crying girl to get a better look at her. "You look like you're having a bad day."

"I...I...I want to die...I can't live like this anymore...I've turned into a horrible person!" Sorane whimpered sadly, wishing more and more that she could turn back time and fix all of the mistakes she made toward Umi. Her stomach rumbled, but she didn't care.

"Come on inside. We'll make you a nice hot dinner," Sojiro told her kindly.

Sorane whipped her head toward him with surprise. "Wait, what?! Are you...serious?"

"You're hungry, right? Come on in. It's okay. I have some clothes you can wear too," Hotaru told her, slipping her clean hand into Sorane's dirty one, not caring about how messy it felt. She helped Sorane up and escorted her inside her house. Sorane is so surprised, she felt her throat clamp shut, unable to speak. Were there actually people who were this generous? They exist after all? Sorane thought she was dreaming. But Hotaru's hand felt real. It had the warmth of a real person, real kindness, something she thought was only an illusion.

"You can use the shower if you want. I'll get some clothes that might fit you," Hotaru said as she escorted Sorane into the bathroom. Sorane hadn't been in a bathroom for months, especially not a clean one. But she knew opportunities like this don't come often, so she had to take it. If anything, Sorane wanted to be clean. Clean of everything.

As soon as she stepped into the bathtub, the rain of water washing away her stress and everything contaminating her dirt covered body, she wanted to stay here forever. Real, clean water! Real soap! Real shampoo! Fresh towels! The fresh aroma of lavender shampoo filling the air! She hadn't felt this good in months, especially after she dried herself off. She finally felt clean. It felt enlightening to finally get all that grubby dirt off of her after all that time on the streets. Not only that, fresh clothes and underwear! Well, pajamas, yes, but nice, clean ones. They were white, short sleeved satin pajamas consisting of a buttoned shirt and knee length shorts, with a pocket on her left breast, with gold stars embroidered on them. Clean clothes! Oh, how good they felt!

Sorane found herself sitting in Hotaru's room, marveling at the many glow in the dark stars there were sticking to every corner of the walls. A real person's bedroom! Sorane hadn't been in a real house in years. She kept her Heart Lighter in her breast pocket. Lovebeam saw her but stayed still as a mannequin, holding her breath. All of a sudden, Hotaru came into the room. "Hi there."

"Oh! I'm sorry! I really should know better than to just waltz in your room!" Sorane exclaimed sheepishly, her face turning beet red in embarrassment. Hotaru just chuckled and sat down with her.

"It's okay. I don't mind at all. I kind of miss having friends over. By the way, I'm Minamigawa Hotaru. What's your name?" Hotaru told her kindly.

"Sa-Sakibara...Sorane," Sorane replied shyly.

"Sorane? Never heard of that one before."

"My dad made it up. You sure have a lot of glow in the dark stars in your room. Do you like astrology by any chance?"

Hotaru's eyes lit up. "Oh, yes! Astronomy and astrology! I just adore studying stars and space!"

Sorane smiled at the younger girl's enthusiasm for what she liked. "Went I get older, I want to become an ornithologist. That's a person who studies birds."

"You like birds?" Hotaru asked curiously. She noticed the Heart Lighter cap sticking out from Sorane's breast pocket but she decided not to ask about it just yet.

Sorane nodded. "I've always liked birds and flying. When I was a kid, I wanted to grow wings but humans can't fly," Sorane remembered the times when she was six, trying to leap off the foot of her bed and flapping her arms up and down before hitting the floor. Sorane chuckled at how silly and naive she was back then. "It always ticked me off that birds could fly and we couldn't. I wanted to fly with them. Have my own wings and go wherever I want, without anyone tying me down," Sorane pulled out her silver bird necklace. "My dad got this for me on my sweet sixteen."

"Sorry if it's rude to ask, but...I take it your parents aren't around anymore?"

Sorane nodded grimly. "They died in a home invasion while I was at school. I was too old to go into foster care, and there was no room for my sister and I," This is where Sorane started to tear up again. "We've...been on the streets ever since."

"I see..." Hotaru couldn't imagine living on the streets. But she noticed a Heart Lighter cap peeking out from Sorane's breast pocket. She let out an inaudible gasp. _'A Heart Lighter?! Is she...? She must be!' _She decided not to bring up the subject with her yet. "You've been through a lot, haven't you?"

Sorane nodded. "I can't believe I'm even telling you all this. You have better things to do than listen to me whine."

Hotaru put a hand on Sorane's shoulder. "It's okay. I'm glad you told me. It's better to talk about things than to keep them bottled up."

"I...I have a sister..." Sorane quivered. "Her name is Umi. She and I got into a fight earlier and..." Sorane's eyesight blurred, and tears came streaming out. "I just left her out there...I'm horrible!" Sorane buried her face into her hands. "I'm a horrible big sister! All I've done is yell at her and treat her like garbage ever since our parents died! And she's a much better person than I could ever be!"

A confused Hotaru couldn't help but be curious as to what led to their fight. But she knew Sorane just wanted to vent, so she let her vent. "She's probably freezing out there. I want to go out and find her..."

Hotaru rubbed her back. "It's okay. I'll ask Kyouichi if we can go out and look for her. Do you have a picture of her?"

The teary eyed older girl rummaged through her pocket and pulled out a folded picture of her family. "It's the only one I have," When Sorane looked up, her eyes locked right onto a blue star shaped perfume bottle on her dresser.

A Heart Lighter.

"WHAT?!" Sorane stood up in alarm. "You have one too?!"

Hotaru took a few steps back, surprised by Sorane's outburst. "Have what?"

"That star shaped thing!"

"Oh...this?" Hotaru pulled her Heart Lighter off of her dresser to show it to Sorane.

"Umi and I have them too!" Sorane pulled hers out of her breast pocket. "See?!"

Hotaru found it to be the perfect time to tell her. "That's called a Heart Lighter."

"A Heart Lighter? Can you...explain all this to me?"

"We'll be happy to!" Lovebeam shouted, feeling it to be safe to talk.

"YEEEK! That plushie just talked!" Sorane shouted in terror.

"Don't be afraid! I'm not gonna hurt you!" Lovebeam told her softly, which calmed her down.

Calmly, Hotaru and Lovebeam both explained everything to Sorane: Zenjin, the Energia, the destruction of the planet called Rozaniela, the Pretty Cure, the fairies, the Heart Lighters, everything that's been going on since April, the history of the Pretty Cure they learned from the archives, etc. Sorane listened intently and drank it all in. A lot of this was so far out. Stuff like this was supposed to be fiction or fantasy. But upon putting the pieces together, everything started to make a whole lot of sense to the frazzled girl. She immediately felt better after hearing all of this new information. Before she could say anything, Sojiro came into the room.

"Girls. Dinner's ready," Sojiro told them.

"Come on. You're probably starving," Hotaru told her, extending her hand out. Confused, Sorane look at her hand, then Hotaru, then at her hand again, then at Hotaru again. Shyly, she took Hotaru's hand and found herself being led to the dining room.

And what a feast they cooked! On each plate are slices of chicken, rice pilaf, mashed potatoes, mandarin oranges, and corn. Not only that, there's a basket of warm, fluffy crescent rolls. The aromas of all the food gently caressed Sorane's hungry nostrils, enticing her to sit at the table and help herself. The idea of a meal seemed so far away to her, like she hadn't had a meal in months.

"Don't be shy. Help yourself," Sojiro told her kindly. Sorane helped herself to some rice pilaf. They may just be particles of rice, but oh, how warm, soft, and lovely they tasted! Sorane found herself in heaven, and began helping herself to the great big meal these kind, magnanimous people cooked for her. This definitely wasn't a dream at all.

"What's your name, dear?" Kyouichi asked.

"Sakibara Sorane," Sorane replied sheepishly before eating some chicken.

"I take it you've been having a tough time," Kyouichi said. "We made this extra special just for you, so feel free to help yourself. There's plenty left."

"Thank you for your generosity," Sorane told him gratefully.

"You're welcome, dear," Sojiro told her kindly.

"Umm...if you don't mind me asking, where are your parents?" Kyouichi asked. Sorane told them everything that happened. "My stars...I'm sorry. I didn't mean to-" Kyouichi wished he hadn't been so insensitive.

"It's okay. I never told anyone about it until now," Sorane confessed shyly.

"You say your sister's still out there, right?" Sojiro asked.

Sorane nodded and showed them the picture. Sojiro and Kyouichi stared at it to brand Umi's face into their minds. "I'd be more than happy to go out and find her for you."

"Is...is that okay, though?"

"Of course it is!"

Sorane smiled gratefully. She liked their family dynamic. She liked their conversations, the smiles they had on their faces, the merry atmosphere. She wished she could stay here. Forever. Away from the streets. Away from taking scraps from trash cans, the rags and tatters she'd have to wear, the lack of money, the jeers, sneers, and ugly looks she'd get from people who don't understand, etc. Just being here made Sorane glow like a light, something that had been diminished for a long time.

For a moment, she felt like she was back at home again with her parents, sharing conversations about silly things that happened, enjoying their meals, creating a merry atmosphere, being herself...the person she thought was gone for good. Later on, Sojiro got in the car and left to go find Umi.

* * *

At that time, Riko invited Kyoya, Anzu, Marina, Chinami, and Fukiko to her house for a fun, happy get-together. Right now, Marina, Fukiko, Hikage, and Rina were at the dining room table, playing Jenga. "Come on, Rina-chan! You can do it!" Marina encouraged Rina to pull out one of the blocks from the already staggering tower.

Cautiously, Rina put her fingers on one block and very slowly pulled it out. To the kids playing, the tension was thick, as their minds were racked with anticipation, wondering if Rina will pull it out successfully or the tower will come crashing down. Finally, Rina pulled the block out and very slowly put it on the top.

"Awesome! You're good, Rina-chan! Just like Riko-chan!" Fukiko exclaimed happily.

Rina blushed. "Thanks."

"My turn!" Hikage exclaimed as he pulled a block out of the tower. But unlike Rina, his actually made the tower come crashing down, sending little rectangle-shaped blocks all over the dining room table and the floor.

"Awwww!" The kids complained.

"I demand a rematch!" Marina edicted.

"Alright alright. Let's do it again!" Anzu chirped cheerfully before picking some blocks up. Rina, Marina, and Hikage followed suit.

"Hey, Chi-chan! Do you wanna play this time?" Fukiko asked.

"Ohh! I haven't played Jenga in months! Can I try?" Chinami squealed happily.

"Sure!" Fukiko added, prompting Chinami to join in on the game. Hikage decided to pass on this game as he went to the living room to watch TV with Arinao.

"Where are Riko-chan and Kyoya-kun?" Chinami asked.

"They're upstairs," Anzu told her.

"Maybe having a lovey dovey moment?" Marina asked.

"What?! No way! That's new coming from you." Anzu piped in, surprised at what just came out of Marina's mouth.

"The world must be ending," Fukiko added sarcastically.

"Hey! Quit making such a big deal out of it!" Marina yelled, causing everyone to laugh. Soon, she found herself laughing. Merrily, not scornfully.

In Riko's room, Riko handed Kyoya a brand new picture of him. His eyes lit up when he saw it. "Wooow. Did you seriously draw this?" Kyoya asked as he took the picture into his hands, in awe of how good Riko managed to draw him.

"Yep. I've been working on it for a while now," Riko told him shyly. "Do you, um...like it?"

"Like it?! Understatement of the millennium! I love it, Ri-chan!" Kyoya cried out and hugged Riko. "Thanks sooooo much! I'll treasure it forever and ever and ever!" Riko could feel his arms squeeze around her, locking her in place. But she didn't mind. In fact, she giggled when he got close and nuzzled her cheek.

"You're welcome," Riko replied before Kyoya let her go. Starbeam smiled at the kids from the corner of Riko's room, reading a new book, _Treasures of the Snow_(1). She just got to the part where the sad, lonely Lucien meets the old man in the woods. Kyoya wanted to talk to Riko more, but he noticed one of Riko's dolls. A big Moomin doll with a big, brown stain on it's large snout.

"Uh, Riko?"

"Yeah?"

"Why's your Moomin doll's nose all brown?"

"You mean this?" Riko pulled her big Moomin doll off the bed and showed it to Kyoya.

"He's supposed to be all white, right? How come his nose is brown?" Kyoya asked curiously.

"UUUGH! Don't get me started!" Riko began loudly. "Two years ago while I was at a therapy session STUPID Rina spilled chocolate milk all over it! She wanted to play tea party with it and I TOLD her not to touch my dolls! But did she listen?! Nooooo! Ugh, I was so mad I even hit her! We both got yelled at for it but Rina shouldn't have touched my doll! Now it's ruined forever, and there's no way to get the stuff off!" Riko adopted a softer tone this time. "I know we're on better terms now, but I still can't forgive her for messing it up. Do you know how hard Moomin dolls are to find these days? You can only find them online now."

"I see," Kyoya said. "That must suck."

"I know, right?!"

Soon, the two kids found themselves laughing. They stopped a little bit afterward. "Um, I was wondering...how's your physical therapy going?"

"Great, if still pretty rough. But I know I'll be able to walk and run again for sure!" Kyoya exclaimed happily.

That's when it hit Riko. "Alrighty then! I have an idea! Let's make a promise!"

"Huh? What kind of promise?"

Riko held out her pinky finger. "If you ever get back to walking and running again, the first thing we'll do together is have a race and see who wins! It doesn't matter where we run. Is that okay?" Riko explained.

Kyoya smiled and locked his pinky finger with hers. "Of course!" They shook their pinky fingers twice before releasing them. "I have to admit, I'm happy you don't make a big deal about my wheelchair."

"I don't really get why people make a big deal out of stuff like that. I see people in wheelchairs all the time, and it's never bothered me," Riko told him in a matter-of-fact way. "It's not like people in wheelchairs are mutated lizard head things with no teeth or skin who are descended from alien cats."

Kyoya burst out laughing at that. "You got that right!"

"But for me it's never too late to join the alien cats! Meow!" Riko chirped, curling one of her hands to look like a cat's paw.

Kyoya calmed down a bit. He really wished he met Riko earlier in life. He's never met anyone as fun, charming, interesting, well-adjusted, and caring as Riko. So what if she was a little eccentric? It doesn't mean she's mean, and she certainly has a solid grasp on the difference between real life and make believe, even though she'd much rather stay away from real life so she can act out her totally safe, cat related fantasies.

"I was wondering...what do you do when you get overwhelmed? Like, on long trips or something? Do you take stuff with you that calms you down?" Kyoya asked.

"Yep! Wanna see?" Riko wasted no time grabbing anything she can think of. "My dad says he knows parents who have kids who make their own comfort kits, which is stuff they bring with them on long trips so if they're nervous or scared, they can calm themselves down with things from home. Let's see...I have...my Nintendo DS and my Pokemon games, my CD player and CDs," Riko pulled out her white Nintendo DSi with a little Skitty charm hanging from it, a blue and grey CD player, and some classical music CDs, like Bach, Mozart, and Vivaldi. There's also the Moomin anime soundtrack CD. "Oh! I have my Snufkin doll, my Skitty doll, my Little My doll, my cat ears and tail, my Luna hat, some books if I wanna read..."

Riko pulled out some dolls, some purple fake cat ears and a matching tail, a black cat eared with a yellow crescent moon on it, and a random Moomin book. "My blanket, my purple stress ball, my sketchbook, and my colored pencils!" Riko pulled out a purple stress ball, a green sketchbook, an old, very used box of colored pencils, some of which are almost completely used up, and a small, soft, purple baby blanket with satin edges. Riko opens up her sketchbook and shows it to Kyoya. "Sometimes I don't draw in it. Instead, I write down fan fic ideas for my Twilight Cat series! The next story I'm working on is about Twilight Cat saving kids from a man who takes them away from their parents because he thinks they're better off without them."

"Pretty cool," Kyoya said. "If you ever become a real mangaka or light novelist, I'd love to read your series!"

Riko giggled a bit.

"Hey, Riko! Come down here for a sec, will ya?" Hikage called from downstairs.

"I'll be down in a second!" Riko cried out before running down the stairs. Kyoya looked down at Riko's so-called comfort kit and smiled sweetly. He wondered if he could make one for himself, when he's out with his relatives and has to put up with his cousin blasting that horrid rap music at full blast. He may not be autistic like Riko is, but that doesn't mean he isn't bothered by overstimulation.

Perhaps...he could add a little something to her kit. Good thing he brought his new camera with him.

"What's up, Niichan?" Riko asked, stopping in her tracks when she noticed a shaggy haired teenager standing next to her brother. "Who are you?"

The shaggy haired boy rubbed his head of hair with his hand sheepishly. "Riko, I want you to meet my friend, Harume Nobuo. He's a game and anime fan like you!"

"It's nice to meet you," Nobuo said, offering his hand out to her.

Riko could feel herself stiffen. "Riko, remember what we told you," Saki whispered. Shyly, Riko extended her hand out and shook it. Very weakly and robot-like. His hands felt a little craggy and sweaty, and she didn't like that.

"Uh...nice...to meet you…" Riko choked out before Nobuo let go of her hand.

"Sorry. She's autistic. She's shy around new people," Hikage explained in a matter-of-fact way.

"I see. That's okay," Nobuo said with a smile before sitting down on the couch.

"Huh. This place is getting packed," Sunbeam whispered.

"Tell me about it. But the more the merrier, right?" Fukiko said. Kyoya managed to come down to the bottom floor and get back in his wheelchair. However, Kyoya wheeled over to Arinao and whispered something in his ear before handing him his camera. Arinao smiled and walked over to Riko.

"Hey Riko. Want to have your picture taken with your friends?" Arinao asked.

"Sure," Riko replied.

"Hey! I want in!" Anzu exclaimed cheerfully with Moonbeam and Sunbeam in her arms.

"Wanna do it outside? It'll give us better lightning," Kyoya asked. Everyone his age agreed. Hikage and Nobuo stayed in the house to hang out a bit. The kids all raced out onto the front yard. Arinao, with Kyoya's camera in his hand, aimed it at the gaggle of kids.

"Alright kids! Say...fuzzy pickles!" Arinao exclaimed. Nobody said it, but the picture got taken anyway.

"Can I take one of Riko and Kyoya?" Marina asked. Arinao handed her the camera.

"Hey, Kyo-chan?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you mind if I sit in your wheelchair? I wanna see what it's like."

"Sure. Fine with me," Kyoya stood up and let Riko sit in his wheelchair like a chivalrous knight. But as soon as Riko sat in it, her body already knew it didn't like it. The material used to make the seat felt really itchy on her legs, and the chair part was so stiff on her back she had to wonder how Kyoya could bear sitting in it. "How is it?"

"The seat is stiff, it makes my legs itch and my back feels tangled up," Riko deadpanned before standing back up.

"Now you know how I feel in that thing," Kyoya retorted teasingly.

"Say fuzzy pickles, you two!" Arinao exclaimed. Both Riko and Kyoya smiled and held up their hands in peace signs. Kyoya had to wrap his arm around Riko in order to keep himself standing. _Click!_ Arinao gave the camera back to Kyoya.

"Thanks!" Kyoya said happily.

"You're welcome," Arinao told him.

* * *

Footnotes:

1\. Treasures In The Snow is a book by Patricia St. John. It was adapted into an anime in 1983 under the title Alps Stories: My Annette.


	33. A Shocking Revelation!

Chapter 31: I Have a Brother?! A Shocking Revelation!

Marina was the first to leave the Tasogare house, as she had to be back by at least five. Hatoko needed her home so they could have dinner together. She trotted down the sidewalk like she usually did, but stopped upon seeing a familiar face sitting on the curb. It was Umi, the girl she and her friends helped before.

But something about Umi didn't look right. She could see some sunbeams shining off of her face. Upon closer inspection, Marina saw that Umi's face was wet with tears. Marina's eyes widened when she saw something in Umi's hand. A Heart Lighter.

_'No way! She has one?! When was there another one?!'_ Marina thought. All kinds of scenarios were flying through her head. One of them was sure to be true: Umi could be a Pretty Cure. But seeing the sad look on her face, she assumed Umi wasn't in the mood for that kind of talk right now. Marina decided to put it in the back of her head for now.

"Hey there."

Umi looked up and saw the curly mop of orange hair standing next to her. "Oh. Asagi-san..."

"Why so glum? Lost your ring again?"

Umi shook her head grimly. Marina sat down next to her. "Wanna talk about it?"

"My sister...she got mad at me."

"She didn't like the birthday present?"

"No. She liked it."

Marina raised an eyebrow. "Then what?"

The black haired girl let out an abject sigh. "I try so hard to help her out...I search for food, I got my own job, I do my schoolwork, I hardly ever leave her side...but...she's always mad now. In fact, she's been like this ever since my parents died."

Marina gave Umi a sympathetic look. "Sorry to hear that."

Umi swung her head around to look Marina in the face. "It's not just that! Sorane acts like she has to protect me from everything or keep me on a leash because she thinks I'm gonna ruin everything or cause trouble. She acts like I'm a baby! Even when I do something just fine she gets mad! I hate that! I mean, I get that she gets stressed out too, and I know it's hard living the way we do." Umi looked down at her hands with a sad look on her face. "But...she never appreciates what I do anymore. She never even says thank you when I help her out. She just yells and acts like I broke a window."

"Ouch. It's a good thing I'm an only child," Marina retorted.

Umi continued to stare down at her hands.

"Sorry. I wasn't trying to be mean."

"It's okay. I get it. It's just...I wish she'd stop acting like I'm six years old. I'm not the person I used to be."

"So she thinks she knows you when she doesn't?"

"I guess you can put it that way, yeah."

"I know the feeling. Somewhat. I...kinda used to be a bully."

Umi's eyes widened and she turned to look at Marina. "Really?"

"Yeah. Only because other kids kept thinking I was gonna be like my dad. He's in prison. I got sick of it, so I guess I...kinda became what they wanted me to be," Marina stretched her arms and legs out. "But I'm over it now."

Umi thought about the time her friends pulled her away from Marina when she found her ring. They had told her something similar, but Umi never believed them. The rumors were true after all. But Umi never believed Marina was a bully. They hardly ever got to interact because they were in different grade levels. Perhaps that proved to be a blessing in disguise.

"I just wish...everything would go back to the way it was before..." Umi mused softly.

"You're pretty upset, aren't you?"

Umi nodded.

"I can't say I know what it's like, but maybe...your big sister'll come around. It'll take some time, but she'll probably figure it out soon. Unless you want me to get up in her face."

Umi shook one of her hands. "No no! It'll be fine. She always apologizes after we're alone for a bit, so that's not necessary. But...you're probably right."

"Say, do you stay anywhere?" Marina asked out of the blue.

Umi looked away. She never did like telling people about her lack of a home, but Marina was nice. She didn't look like one of those girls who'd make a big deal about it, so why not? "We live at the Sunshine Shelter. I don't really like it, though. Some people like to steal our stuff. It's pretty crowded in there, too. We can't stay there during the day because the employees want people to find jobs."

"Hey. Here's an idea. Wanna hang out at my place for the night?" Marina suggested with a warm smile on her face.

Umi did a double take. "What?! Really?!"

"Is...that bad?"

"No no! I'd love to stay with you for a while! It's just...Sorane's still out there and she might be worried about me," Umi clarified.

"I see. But it's gotta suck being out on the streets all dirty and starving."

"That I agree with."

Marina's eyes lit up. "How about this? You can stay at my house, and I can tell some of my friends about your sister later on so they can go and look for her."

Umi found herself growing teary eyed. "You always do so much for me..."

Marina blushed and brushed her hand through her hair. "Aw, shucks. It's no big deal," Marina took Umi's hand and pulled her out of the bench. "Come on. I'll have Mom cook a nice dinner for you."

Right then and there, Umi's stomach let out a roar, begging for food. "Case in point," Umi mused with a rueful laugh.

The two girls walked home together, chatting about whatever they could think of. Music, fish, their favorite manga, their favorite bands, the future, etc. Neither of them mentioned the Heart Lighters. Marina didn't think this was a good time to mention the Pretty Cure stuff to her yet. After a short while, they arrived at Marina's house. The first thing Marina heard was her mother talking on the phone.

"How about after that, we go out to dinner? The Sunshine Diner's a great place," Hatoko said on the phone in a cutesy voice, with rosy cheeks.

"Hey Mom! I'm back!"

"Hi, Mari!" Hatoko chirped before returning to the phone. "Great! I'll see you there! Bye!" Hatoko hung the phone up. "You're a little late today," Hatoko said before taking notice of Umi. "Who is she?"

"She's my new friend Umi," Marina exclaimed.

Umi looked down and shuffled her feet shyly. "He-He-Hello..." Umi hoped Hatoko wouldn't notice her drab clothes, even though she knew she would.

Surprisingly enough, Hatoko didn't mention them at all. "It's nice to meet you, Umi-chan!"

Umi's stomach growled, making her red as a broiled lobster. Hatoko got the idea. "I better get dinner started. Make yourself at home, Umi-chan!"

"Can she use our shower?" Marina asked.

Umi's face turned red again. "Why'd you ask that?!"

"That's fine! Just clean up after you're done!" Hatoko replied cheerfully.

Umi's jaw was agape. Hatoko was okay with a random girl using her shower? She shrugged. She said yes, and she hadn't had another shower in a while, so she figured she might as well make the best of it. She tried not to take too long, and Marina gave her some spare clothes she could use. After that, Marina picked up her phone and decided to call one of the girls. She decided on Hotaru since she was the oldest and their de facto leader. After a few rings, Hotaru answered. "Hello? Marina? Is that you?"

"Hey, Hotaru. It's me."

_"What's up? You usually never call me."_

"Sorry about that. But get this: I ran into Umi just now and she told me she and her sister had a fight, so I invited her to stay at my place."

_"Really? Because her sister Sorane-san is with me right now!"_

Marina did a double take. "Whoa! Seriously?!"

_"Yes. In fact, my father was just about to go and look for Umi-chan. Good thing you called. Umi-chan's at your house, right?"_

Marina sure didn't expect this. But then again, happy accidents happen. "Yes she is. I had called because I was gonna ask if we could go out and look for her big sis so they could make up." She could hear Hotaru telling Sojiro that he didn't need to go out anymore.

_"Actually, I'd advise against having them meet back up."_

"How come?"

_"Sorane-san's pretty frustrated with herself, and I'm sure Umi-san might be, too. She told me about their fight. I think it'd be better if they took a day to cool off."_

Marina sighed. "Good point. Well, Umi's with me so you don't have to worry about her being lost or anything. Also...there's something else."

_"What is it?"_

"She has a Heart Lighter."

_"My! Sorane-san has one, too."_

Yet another double take. "Okay, this is just weird. How'd they even get them? But anyway, I want to ask Umi about it, but I'm not sure if I should or not. I don't want to scare her. That or I'm afraid she won't believe me."

_"Sorane found out about me, and I already explained some things to her. I think it'd be best if you told her the truth. Be honest with her."_

Marina smiled. "I see. I'll do that. How about we meet up tomorrow at noon so we can get them back together. We can fill them in on our mission and ask them if they want to join us or not. Two new Pretty Cures? You have to admit, that's pretty great."

_"That'd be nice. I'll let Sorane-san know. Thank you for calling. But I do wish we could just talk, y'know? No Pretty Cure business. Just normal girl stuff."_

Marina had to admit, she had always wanted someone she could chat on the phone with for hours, like the girls she saw in those movies. They would talk about girl stuff all day long. Why couldn't Marina do that? "How about right now?"

_"Is that okay?"_

"Sure! Hey! Have you ever heard of Blue Moon? They're my favorite band!"

Marina and Hotaru found themselves talking for a long while. About their favorite music, food, the loneliness they felt in their early years, etc. Marina was surprised at how much she had in common with Hotaru, such as their love for Blue Moon. Hotaru was a fan, though not as much as Marina was. Marina never thought Hotaru was an outcast like she was. Marina always assumed Hotaru was a popular girl who was well liked. But the fact that they were friends said a lot about her, so Marina didn't mind. They were just happy to have friends at all.

Later, Umi got out of the shower. She came out all smiles, and Marina could smell the scent of her mother's favorite rose flavored shampoo from Umi's hair. Marina pulled out her Heart Lighter and showed it to Umi. The black haired girl's eyes widened with surprise. "Wow! You have one, too?!"

Marina nodded calmly. Then Umi blurted out, "Does that mean you're a magical girl, too?!"

Once again, a double take. "How'd...how'd you guess?"

"It's gotta be! Awesome!" Umi leaped onto Marina and trapped her in a tight hug. "Yay! A fellow magical girl! Hey! We can be a team of superheroes who can save the world and fight crime! That'd be super duper awesome!"

"Whoa there, nelly," Marina gently pried Umi off. "I'm not the only one. Remember Riko, Anzu, and Hotaru?"

Umi's eyes glimmered joyfully. "Are they magical girls, too?!"

"Whoa. You're good," The orange haired girl had to wonder if Umi really liked magical girls. That had to be the only way she knew so much about them. "But yes, they are. We're called Pretty Cure."

"Like the anime?"

"Yep."

Marina took the time to explain everything to Umi. Rozaniela, Zenjin, Pretty Cure, their mission, and everything that's transpired since last April. A wide eyed, curious Umi took it all in without a single interruption. In fact, her smile widened with everything Marina told her. "Woooow. That's so cool."

Marina crossed her arms. "Being a Pretty Cure isn't all fun and games, Umi. People have died."

"I know. I want to save people!" Umi exclaimed, pumping her fist. "Can I join your Pretty Cure team?!"

"Sure. The more the merrier."

Umi shouted, "YAAAAY!" before jumping up and down all around the room. It must be confessed that Hatoko could hear the thuds of her feet all the way from downstairs. Marina had to put her hands on Umi's shoulders to calm her down.

"Calm down. Mom doesn't know about what we do, and I don't want to put her in danger," Marina explained, holding a finger to her mouth.

Umi got the message. "Okay. I won't tell anyone. I promise."

"Um...I talked to one of my friends. She and the rest of the gang are gonna meet up tomorrow so they can meet you and Sorane-san. We'd love to have you on the team."

"That'd be great! I'd love to fight alongside you!" Umi chirped sweetly. But her smile faded and she looked down at her hands with a frown. "I wonder if Neechan's still mad at me. I...said some things to her that weren't very nice."

Marina put a hand on her shoulder. "We all have at some point in our lives. You can sleepover tonight and cool off. How about that?"

Umi nodded. "Thank you. You...don't have to do so much for me."

"I don't mind. I kinda like talking to you."

"Me too."

"Girls!" Hatoko called out from downstairs. "Dinner's ready!"

* * *

"Kyo-chan? What are you doing?" Lovebeam asked Kyoya one day. She left Hotaru's house to go and visit Kyoya. She saw that he was getting a large piece of paper and putting pictures of himself, his family, and many other relatives on it. He wasn't gluing them to the paper, only putting very small rolls of tape on the back of the photos and sticking them to the paper.

"It's a project for English class. We have to make family trees," Kyoya told her.

"Ohhhh! I get it! I used to love doing those back when I was little!" Lovebeam chirped sweetly, fondly recalling memories of when she had to make a family tree in school. She even remembered trying to glue flowers to the paper she made it on to make it look fancy, which didn't turn out so well. Kyoya kept on working.

"Hmm...I have my mom, my dad, my uncles, my aunt, my annoying cousin, and...doh!" Kyoya brushed his hand through his cherry red hair. "I don't have pictures of my grandparents!" Kyoya exclaimed.

"Do you need those?" Lovebeam asked.

"Yeah. If I don't put my grandparents on here, I'll get a bad grade," Kyoya said.

"If you want, I can help you find pictures of your grandparents!" Lovebeam suggested.

"Thanks, but no thanks. You don't know what they look like," Kyoya clarified.

"Oh," Lovebeam became a little down. Kyoya rubbed her pink fur gently.

"I appreciate the thought. I don't know what they look like either, so I'll ask Mom where she keeps family pictures at," Kyoya told her before rolling to the top of the stairs. "Hey, Mom?"

"What is it, Kyo-chan?" Kayoko asked as she walked to the bottom of the stairs.

"Do you know where you keep family pictures at?"

"Hmm...I know I have a scrapbook in my room somewhere. Do you need some?"

"I need pictures of my grandparents!"

"I see. There's a small scrapbook on top of my dresser. I can get it for you if you want."

"No thanks. I'll try it myself. Thanks!"

"Be careful," Kayoko told him, but Kyoya was already rolling into his mother's room, so he didn't hear it. Kayoko sighed and went back to reading her Kenji Miyazawa novel.

Kyoya rolled into his parents' room. It was a simple room, with a big bed, two dressers, two closets (one big and one small), and some other odds and ends, namely a basket full of dirty clothes Jiroemon hadn't gotten around to washing yet. Kyoya looked up at the beige dresser. He noticed a small, light blue photo album on the very top of it. He couldn't reach it in his wheelchair, but if he stood up, he could reach it easily. He rolled in front of the dresser, pulled himself out of it so he could stand upright, and reached for the album. He couldn't quite get it at first, but after standing on his toes, he managed to grasp it. However, he slipped a little and fell back in his wheelchair. He wasn't hurt, and he had the album in his hand.

"Got it!" Kyoya exclaimed. Then he noticed some small papers scattered around his feet. "Ack! I better pick these up!" Kyoya sat on the floor and picked up the papers, which were actually additional pictures.

There was one that caught his eye. It was a picture of a cute, plump, newborn baby. It's eyes were closed, it was wearing a white and red knitted hat, and it was partially wrapped in a white, blue, green, and yellow baby blanket, with some of it's body and legs exposed.

Kyoya smiled. "Mom really needs to quit fawning over my baby pictures," Kyoya mused to himself sweetly. But when he turned the picture around, that was when things got odd.

On the bottom right corner of the picture, there was a date of birth written on it. 9/26/1998.

"Huh? 1998?" Kyoya asked himself. "That can't be right! I was born in 2001! In April!" With the baby picture in his hand, he rolled into his room and put the album on his bed before rolling out. "I oughta ask Mom about this. She might have gotten the date wrong."

He got out of his manual wheelchair, slowly and carefully maneuvered himself down the stairs, and got in his electric wheelchair, taking care not to wreck the baby picture in his hands. Finally, he found Kayoko in the living room reading a book. "Hey, Mom? Can I ask you something?"

"Sure, Kyo-chan. What is it?"

"This baby picture fell off your dresser by accident, but the date on it is wrong," Kyoya said, showing her the picture. "It says 1998, but I was born in 2001. Did you maybe get the date wrong...or…" Kyoya kept on asking about it, but he stopped when he began to notice something odd about Kayoko.

As soon as she saw the baby picture, her eyes became wide, filled to the brim with fear, like she saw a ghost. Kayoko put a hand over her mouth. Soon, much to Kyoya's surprise, Kayoko suddenly began crying a little. Some tears came right out, like she just saw the saddest thing in the world.

"Uh...Mom? Did I...do something wrong?" Kyoya asked worriedly. He knew very well that Kayoko always fawned over his baby pictures. She never cried at any of them, especially not like this.

"Oh…" Kayoko wiped some tears away and looked at Kyoya. "No, it's not you. It's...come sit. There's something you need to know," Kayoko gestured for Kyoya to sit with her on the couch. He pulled himself out of the wheelchair and onto the couch.

"What's up?"

"You see. The baby in that picture...isn't you."

"Really?" Kyoya asked. "Then whose is it? A friend? My cousin?"

Kayoko shook her head grimly. "Listen, Kyoya. Before you were born, your father and I...we…" Kayoko's voice caught a little as she said this, like choking this out was extremely hard to do. "We had...another child. A boy. His name was Yuusuke. Mitomo Yuusuke."

It didn't take much for Kyoya to put the pieces together. But he couldn't believe it. His eyes were wide, and his mouth was agape for a brief moment. "So...I have a brother?"

"_Had_ a brother."

"Had?" Kyoya asked, already noticing something grim behind this new revelation. "What do you mean had? Is he gone?"

"Three weeks after he was born, he got sick, and we had to take him back to the hospital for treatment. But..." Kayoko began crying again. Kyoya looked away upon hearing some sobs sneak out of her mouth. "Someone...someone kidnapped him in the middle of the night…" Kayoko choked out. "The security cameras weren't working at the time. Police, detectives, and everyone in the neighborhood searched high and low for him. But they all came up empty."

His heart went out to Kayoko. It must be absolutely terrible to lose a child like that, and for about fifteen years with absolutely no confirmation on whether he's even alive or not. Then something else hit Kyoya. When the accident happened, Kayoko was absolutely out of control, convinced that she would lose her son in that wreckage right then and there. Could Yuusuke's kidnapping have played a part in making both her and Jiroemon such worry warts over his welfare? She lost one child. She seemed deathly afraid to lose Kyoya, too. Learning this new information painted his parents in a new light for him at that moment. Kayoko buried her face in her hands and cried again.

"Oh, Mom. I'm sorry! I didn't mean to make you sad!" Kyoya exclaimed, already feeling bad about making her remember those bad memories.

"It's okay. You needed to find out sooner or later. It's just...I think of Yuusuke every day. There has never been a day in fifteen years where I haven't prayed for his safety, prayed that he's alive, hoping that he's okay. But..." Kayoko slammed a fist on the cushion beneath her. "I just wish I can have some closure! I want to know if he's alive or not! I don't want to spend my whole entire life not knowing!" Kayoko cried into her hands.

Kyoya scooched over to her and hugged his crying mother, like he was a father trying to comfort a daughter who was having a bad day. He had never seen Kayoko this sad and scared before. She had always been strong, upbeat, and positive, even if she could be a bit of a worry wart sometimes, but never to the point where she'd try to fight his battles for him. Even she knew better than to baby Kyoya. That was what he always liked about Kayoko: she knew how strong and capable he was, and always believed in him. Where did this sad, scared, fragile woman come from?

"So...Yuusuke's still out there?"

Kayoko nodded grimly. "The case has gone cold. Jiroemon has decided to move on. He said he doesn't think Yuusuke would like it if we spent our lives being sad and worrying all the time. I've been trying to move on, too. But it's just too hard. I don't know how I've managed to keep it together for this long, and I especially don't know how Jiro's been able to do it. But I know for a fact that he's always worrying about you, even after the accident. I'm sorry we never told you about him earlier."

"It's okay. It must have been sad," Kyoya told her. "It's funny. I used to wish for a sibling. Or even a younger sibling so I'd know what it's like to be driven crazy by their antics. Or maybe I could have done the same with Yuusuke."

Kayoko cracked a smile a bit. "Yuusuke was a very good baby. He hardly ever cried, and was always smiling at everything, like he wanted to take on the world. All of my family members fawned over him, and they all wanted to hold him and sing to him and make faces at him and everything. He always seemed to bring out everyone's best."

"Do you...mind if I keep this picture?"

"I don't mind. But do be careful with it. It's one of the only pictures we have of him," Kayoko told him. With that, Kyoya trapped her in a tight hug, to let her know that he's not going anywhere.

"I love you, Mom. I won't let anyone take me away from you like whoever took Yuusuke," Kyoya whispered kindly. Kayoko hugged him back.

"I know how strong you are. Even after the accident, you never doubted yourself. I don't care if you're paralyzed. Good parents don't care about deficiencies. You'll always be my son. Both you and Yuusuke are my babies," Kayoko whispered.

'_Okay, that part is a bit embarrassing,'_ Kyoya thought, but considering everything she went through, he decided not to say that. He also had to wonder: Where is Yuusuke? What's happening to him? Is he being treated well or bad? Like Kayoko, Kyoya couldn't help but wonder.

But one thing's for sure: he couldn't wait to tell his friends about it!

* * *

"Okay, have you guys SEEN My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic yet?! I freaking love it!" Anzu suddenly chirped one day in homeroom, looking more joyful and radiant than a blooming sunflower basking in spring sunshine. And not only that, nobody was freaked out or weirded out by it. Instead, Riko, Chinami, and even Marina joined in on her fangasming.

"I know, right?! I love it, too! I didn't think I would but I caught my big sister watching it and oh my gosh, it's so great! It doesn't make me wanna barf like most kids shows do!" Chinami chirped.

"I've loved it even before it came to Japan! I even saw some episodes in English, it's original language! But I don't like what they did with Rainbow Dash's voice in this dub. She sounds like she smoked a bunch of cigarettes," Riko piped in.

"Not only that, I am IN LOVE with this fan fic I found called _She's Gonna Get There Soon_ by someone named Blueberry Muffin! It's sooooo adorable! I think you'll really like it, Riko-chan," Anzu squealed cheerfully. "The main character is a lot like you and goes through some of the things you went through, but it's super duper sweet and charming!"

"I'll check it out when I get home," Riko said with a smile.

"Me too," Marina said. "I really like Applejack. She's strong, and orange is my favorite color anyway."

"Me too!" Anzu agreed.

"I like Twilight and Fluttershy. They're both a lot like me! Fluttershy likes animals and Twilight is smart, purple, and likes reading," Riko added.

"Pinkie's my favorite!" Chinami piped in.

Kyoya found this to be a good opportunity to wheel over to them. "Hi girls!"

"Hey, Kyo-chan! Come join us in our love for My Little Pony discussion!" Riko exclaimed, causing Chinami, Anzu, and Marina to laugh.

"Actually, I have something I wanna tell you all," Kyoya said.

"What's up?" Fukiko asked, suddenly approaching them.

Kyoya spilled the news.

"Wait, what?! Since when did you have a brother?!" Marina yelped while everyone else is so speechless they look frozen in time.

"I didn't find out about it until yesterday," Kyoya explained.

"So...what happened to him? How come we never met him?" Riko asked.

"He...got kidnapped before I was born. They never found him," Kyoya replied in a softer voice, adopting a sad tone.

"Is he dead?" Marina asked.

"Hey! You're not supposed to ask questions like that!" Fukiko piped in.

"Nobody knows. The case went cold," Kyoya replied.

"We never knew," Riko said, looking a little sad. "He must be sad or scared."

"I thought about putting him in my family tree project, but we don't have many pictures of him so I don't wanna ruin one of them," Kyoya said.

"You should!" Marina piped in.

"Huh?" Everyone turned to look at Marina.

"I think you should. Even if you don't know him all that well or know where he is, he's still your brother. If your family's thought about him for a long time, then he's still part of your family. I think it'd be rude to just leave him out of your family tree like that," Marina said.

"I agree," Chinami said. "My sister drives me nuts sometimes but she still loves me. I'm even putting in grandparents who I haven't met because they helped my parents meet."

"My mom keeps begging me to put her grandmother on my tree because she was there for her when she needed her," Fukiko piped in.

They have good points. He smiled. "Sure. I'll do it. I'll ask about it later on."

"Oh! I almost forgot!" Marina exclaimed. She told everyone about Sorane and Umi, reminding them of their plans after school.

"So Hotaru-chan's gonna meet us at the park after school, right?" Riko asked. Marina nodded. "But doesn't she normally have naginata practice today?"

"She says it got cancelled today," Marina clarified.

"Looks like you made new friends. That sounds cool," Fukiko added.

"Have you seen her transform into a Pretty Cure, yet?" Kyoya asked.

"No. I wanna wait on that," Marina replied tersely.

School went by like usual. Only one problem. "WHAT?! A 58?!" Chinami yelped when she got her most recent English test back. A big red fifty-eight dominated the top right corner of her English test. Before, Chinami was on top of the world, but now, she wanted to crawl under a rock. "But...but...but I studied! I spent three hours studying this every day! My dad's gonna blow a gasket when he sees this!" She cried.

"I don't know what to tell you, Takayama. You can retake it next week if you want," Mrs. Oginome told her.

"It's okay, Chi-chan," Riko told her reassuringly. "You did way better than Shimura. I hear he got a 30."

"That sucks," Fukiko said. "English isn't one of my best subjects either, so I feel you, Chi-chan."

"But I have to show this to my dad, and he always flips out whenever I get a bad grade. He won't believe that I really studied this time thanks to Minako!"

"Minako?" Riko asked.

"She's her sister. She's really smart. I hear she has an IQ of 175," Fukiko whispered. They wanted to talk more, but class was going on, so they had to get back to the lesson. Chinami knew for a fact that she was NOT looking forward to going home, especially since English was the final period before school ends. She wished school would go on forever.

After school, Riko, Anzu, Kyoya, Fukiko, Umi, and Marina all went to the park to wait for Hotaru and Sorane. It was empty today, so they killed some time by chatting amongst themselves happily. It took a few minutes, but both Hotaru and Sorane arrived on the scene.

"Hey, Umi."

"Hey, Sorane."

Hotaru nudged the kids. "Let's leave them alone for a bit."

Everyone agreed and went someplace close by. There was an awkward pause between them until Umi spoke first. "I-I-I want to say I'm sorry for all the bad things I said yesterday," She sputtered shyly.

"Same here. I'm sorry, too."

"I'm glad."

"Me too."

"We're cool now, right?"

"We're cool."

"..."

"..."

"...We're not cool, are we?"

Sorane's expression was mournful. "Yeah. I can see it on your face."

"Sorane..." Umi began. "Please don't get me wrong. I know you do so much for me, and I really do appreciate it. Really, I do. I see how you come back all stressed out and irritated. I found a little job and stay after school for long times so you could have a break...and so I could help you."

Sorane flashed a small smile, encouraging her to continue. She wished she was as dutiful and honest as Umi was. This gave Umi the strength to continue. "But ever since...we lost our family, you've been sad and mad all the time. I know it's hard, but...I miss the old you. The happy you. You always appreciated everything I did. Now you always get mad. I know it's because you can't get a job, probably because of other stuff, and that's fine, but...I don't like it when you're mad."

"I know," Sorane agreed with a solemn nod. "I don't like it anymore than you do. I should have...been more appreciative of what you tried to do. I...I really loved the birthday present you got me. I keep it with me all the time. I don't want it getting stolen. The fact that you went out of your way to get that for me...I guess...in a way it made me angry. Seeing you grow up like this made me angry. It's my job to provide for you and protect you, and I can't even do that. You're the one providing for me and protecting me," Sorane clutched her skirt tightly. "I shouldn't have snapped at you like that, especially during that battle. You were a better superhero than I could ever be."

"I'm sure you'll be a great superhero!" Umi exclaimed with a smile, easing the tension a bit. "Which does bring me to another thing. I'm...not the troublemaker I used to be. I know you think I'm still six years old, but-"

Sorane held her hand up. "I know. I need to stop being such a nag. It's not good for you or me. You did save the town after all. I should have trusted you more."

Umi fought the urge to say, "Yeah! You should have!" She knew it'd be rude, so she kept quiet. But she did say, "I'm sorry I said all those mean things about you! You're the best big sister ever!"

"I'm sorry I keep treating you like a baby, ADHD or not! You're the best little sister ever!"

"I'm sorry I broke the glass bird you bought when I was eight!"

"I'm sorry I ate your favorite jello that one time!"

"I'm sorry I called you a Demon Ornith!"

"I'm-" Sorane was brought up short. "You never called me that."

"I called you that in secret when you were being REALLY annoying, like yesterday. Sorry!"

Sorane shook her head and hugged her little sister. "Oh, I'm over it. Wanna be Pretty Cure?"

Umi nodded. "Hey! Wanna meet my friends?! They're Pretty Cure, too!"

Sorane blinked. "What?!" Since when were there more?! Oh wait, Hotaru already told her about her friends.

The kids found it safe to return. "So you've made up?" Kyoya asked.

"Yep! This is my big sister, Sorane! She's Cure Skylight and I'm Cure Sealight!" Umi told Sorane about them. They couldn't wait to befriend them. All of a sudden, Anzu's phone rang.

"Hello? What?! Why does it have to be now? Why can't you tell me over the phone?" Anzu let out a sigh. "Alright. I'll be there in a few."

"What's the matter?" Hotaru asked.

"My dad wants me home. He says he wants to tell me something."

* * *

Chinami stood before her front door, clutching her test tightly. She wished she could just crumple it up and throw it in the trash. She prayed with all her heart that her parents wouldn't ask about the test.

Sadly for Chinami, her prayers went unanswered. She walked inside and her father saw the paper in her hand. She knew she had no choice but to show everyone the bad grade she got. As expected, her father was NOT happy.

"Really, Chinami. You really need to stop lollygagging with your hair stylers and hoarding snacks! That's why your grades are so bad, because you don't care about putting any effort into your studies!" Her father exclaimed. Chinami squeezed her eyes shut and flinched.

"Dad! I studied really hard this time, I swear!" Chinami argued.

"Then how do you explain this grade?! Why can't you be more like Minako? She actually cares about her schoolwork and knows how to use her time wisely," Her father snapped.

"Dad. Quit it," Chinami's older sister chimed in. She was about Zenjin's age, with a short, fluffy mop of jet black hair and light brown eyes. "She's doing the best she can. I helped her study a few times."

"Yes, dear. You really don't need to make such a big deal out of it. She's gotten better at her other subjects," Her mother added.

Despite their standing up for her, Chinami didn't feel better. Not one bit. She wanted to crawl under a rock. She wished her father wasn't so uptight about her grades. Finally, her father relented and went to another room. Minako put both hands on Chinami's shoulders. "It's okay, Chi-chan. You said you can retake the test next week, right? How about we study English for one hour every day? You're sure to pass on the retake!"

"No I won't," Chinami muttered.

"Chinami, dear…" Her mother said worriedly.

"Even if I spend the entire week studying until my eyes bleed, I'll never pass this test! Or any test!" Chinami suddenly cried out sadly, looking like she was near tears. "I hate school! I hate studying! No matter how hard I try, I'll never be as smart and perfect as you, Minako! But noooo! You all want me to be perfect and super duper smart! _'Why can't you be more like Minako? You're soooo stupid and lazy, Chinami!'_ I'm sick of it!"

"You know that's not true-" Minako tried to reason with her, but Chinami didn't want to hear it and just ran right out of the house, leaving a worried mother and Minako in the house. All Chinami's father did was sit at the dining room table sipping coffee.

* * *

Anzu strolled along the sidewalk, playing a happy little tune on her cherished harmonica, watching the birds sing and the squirrels scurry along. The weather wasn't too great, as it was cloudy and muggy, but it wasn't to the point where it's going to rain, so she doesn't mind. Even though she wanted to stay with her friends, she figured playing her harmonica would lift her spirits a bit. No bad weather could ever try to diminish her happy mood. In fact, her cup of happiness was already full, but it was going to overflow like the Niagara Falls when she gets home. When she stepped through the door, she saw her dad sitting on the couch, reading some letter.

"What's the matter?" Anzu asked. Junnosuke put the letter down and wiped a tear from his eye. With a smile on his face.

"Anzu…" Junnosuke choked out. "It's Reika...she...she signed them."

"Signed what?" It's here that Sunbeam floated into Anzu's pocket. Junnosuke didn't notice.

"The...the divorce papers," That was all it took for Anzu to drop her book bag and freeze like she became frozen in time. "This letter came with it. She has decided to pursue a new path in life, and is sorry for everything she's done to us."

"So...you mean...we're free?" Anzu choked out.

Junnosuke nodded.

Anzu felt like bursting into song. But instead, she simply cheered and jumped all around the room. "YAAAY! Yay yay yay yay yay!" Anzu leaped onto Junnosuke, planted a big kiss on his cheek, and let go of him. "Can I tell my friends?!"

"Sure, sweetie. Just be back before six," Junnosuke told her.

Anzu wasted no time dashing out of the house. Last month, she felt chained to the ground thanks to Reika. But now, she felt like she could soar in the sky, free to fly wherever she wants. Her face was radiant before, but now it's almost blinding. Sunbeam flew next to her as Anzu sprinted on the streets, feeling like she could run a marathon.

"Isn't this great, An-chan?" Sunbeam exclaimed.

"Oh, you bet it is! Woohoo! I HAVE to tell everyone!" Anzu shouted before doing another jump in the air. She had to tell them. They needed to hear this. Anzu couldn't wait to run back to the park and tell them the amazing news.

However, something stopped her in her tracks. Good news: it wasn't Reika. Bad news: it was a bloodcurdling scream, and usually when there's screams, there's Zenjin trying to dip his head in someone's Soul Portal. Anzu wasted no time getting her cell phone out and texting everyone as she ran to the scene. When she and Sunbeam got there, they gasped.

Chinami was strapped to a wall, screaming, with someone dunking their head into her Soul Portal. But it wasn't Zenjin.

The person had green hair.

"Decebal?!" Anzu put her hands over her mouth, but Sunbeam wasn't one to do that. In a split second, Anzu transformed into Cure Dawn and landed a punch on Decebal so hard that she sent him flying on the concrete. But he was successful in both yanking out and corrupting her soul orb. The black orb glowed and turned into a big, black, red eyed sheep. But instead of going around, wrecking everything, it decided to snack on some tree leaves.

"Tch! This Corrupt Sentinel is a lazy sloth!" Decebal hissed as he struggled to get back on his feet.

"Stop right there, knave!" The booming voice of Cure Twilight echoed from a nearby rooftop. Decebal looked up to find four Pretty Cures-Skylight and Sealight included. They all descended before the frazzled green haired man.

"I am the light that will brighten your world, Cure Twilight!"

"I am the lights that will illuminate the darkness, Cure Starlight!"

"I am the light that will warm your heart, Cure Dusk!"

Cure Dawn had already transformed, but she decided to join them. "I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

"I am the light that sparkles on the ocean waves, Cure Sealight!"

"I am the light whose wings radiate the sky, Cure Skylight!"

"We shall banish the darkness with the lights from our hearts, Luminous Pretty Cure!"

Cure Twilight turned around to find Chinami's body lying on the ground and gasped. "Chi-chan!"

Decebal drew his rapier and pointed it at them. "I see you're still stubborn little brats who refuse to accept your destiny as servants to your future husbands!"

Sorane facepalmed. "God, is he sexist or what?!"

"It's just a bunch of garbly-guck. Ignore him," Cure Dusk told him.

"Who's he?" Cure Sealight asked.

"His name's Decebal," Cure Dawn whispered.

"_I hate studying!"_ The sheep baaed as it ate more leaves from a nearby tree. _"I try so hard...but I'll never be good at school like my friends are!"_

Cure Skylight balled her fists. "Sealight and I'll take the sheep. You girls take care of the green haired man," Cure Skylight told everyone. They nodded. Twilight, Dawn, Starlight, and Dusk went after Decebal while Skylight and Sealight wasted no time dealing with the sheep. But she took note of the buildings and trees around here. _'I better be careful with my powers. There are people here,'_ Skylight thought.

"Drowning Aquarius!" Sealight was quick to create a watery chain that wrapped itself right around the sheep. The sheep baaed and struggled to break free, flailing its hooves up and down. But it didn't do any good. Sealight flashed a thumb's up and winked. "All yours, partner!"

Skylight nodded. "Wings of light, give me the power to fly toward greater heights! Skylight Phoenix!" Skylight encased herself in light shaped like a phoenix and completely consumed the giant fluffy sheep. The girls and even Decebal stared in awe at how powerful the attack was. It was so strong it made the sheep completely disappear, leaving behind Chinami's Soul Orb. Gently, Skylight picked it up and dropped it in Chinami's Soul Portal. The color returned to her face.

"Why couldn't we defeat a CS that quickly?!" Cure Dusk yelped.

"We didn't get to do a combined finishing attack," Cure Sealight agreed. But she was happy she got to save their friend.

Cure Dawn noticed Decebal trying to run away. "Ohhh no you don't! Chains of Light!" Cure Dawn summoned an array of glowing, sun shaped chains from her hands and they coiled right around Decebal, trapping him, rendering him unable to run. All six Pretty Cure girls surrounded him, along with the fairies, all staring at Decebal with icy faces. Cure Dawn kept a solid grip on her chains.

"Haven't seen you in a while," Cure Starlight said. She pulled her naginata out and pointed it at Decebal, who showed absolutely no reaction. "We want answers. Now. So spill."

'_Wow. I never knew Hotaru-chan could be this cold. True, it's for good reason, but I'm getting goosebumps just looking at her like that,'_ Skylight thought, rubbing her arm, trying to get the goosebumps off. Cure Dusk followed suit and pointed her bow and arrow at Decebal, but this time with a flaming look on her face.

"Will you turn yourself in peacefully? Or do we have to do it by force, because we will!" Sunbeam piped in.

Sealight looked away. She didn't want them to resort to that, even though they knew him better than she did. Whoever he was, he must have done some bad things to them if they were going to deal with him so harshly.

"I know for a fact that King Ghislain is going to rip you a new one after everything you've done to him! He'd be more than happy to ship you off to jail, and you'll be the very first prisoner on all of Rozaniela!" Lovebeam added.

"I'd rather eat poison than return to that saccharine happy-happy planet and be brainwashed by their hypocrisy," Decebal hissed like he meant it.

"Hypocrisy? Care to define that?" Cure Dusk hissed.

"The King and Queen are nothing but idealistic idiots who want nothing more than to steal people from Earth and brainwash them into thinking that no suffering or hardship exists!" Decebal howled.

"Uh, no. They only take in abandoned babies and orphans. That's all, and it's only to give them good lives that Earth didn't give them. Yeah, even I know that's kidnapping, but they have good intentions," Cure Twilight said in a matter-of-fact way.

"That's just it! The humans they steal aren't given the opportunity to truly take control of their lives! To rise up from their suffering and come out better than ever! But Rozaniela…" Decebal hissed, like talking about them is tantamount to going to Hades' underground quarters. "All everyone on there wants to do is shower them with untrue ideas about happiness and pleasure, keeping them in a cage, and locking them away, shielding them from everything bad in the world! All that does is tarnish their true potential! The King and Queen don't want anyone to know what suffering and hardship is, but that's what makes a real human being! None of you twits know what suffering is!"

"Hey! Yes we do!" Sealight yelled. She couldn't believe it. She and her older sister lived on the streets for months, yet he had the nerve to say they didn't know what suffering was?

Skylight stared him down. "I've been on the streets! Does that not count as suffering in your book?!"

"Oh, I can tell you've suffered. You know what it's like to feel weak and insignificant," Decebal hissed. "It's the rest of you who know nothing of suffering."

"We've all been through some bad experiences in our lives!" Marina piped in.

"Then why do you bother saving that saccharine planet?!"

"We're superheroes. It's our duty to right wrongs and triumph over evil," Riko told him in a casual way. "Would YOU like it if someone tried to hurt YOU and YOUR planet and everything else you love and hold dear? But the only reason we want to put you to justice is because you let Zenjin destroy everything and don't even stop him."

"Do you really think letting him kill people for kicks is going to get your point across? Because all it does is paint both you and him in a bad light," Anzu said.

"Hmph! I don't care what anyone thinks. I will achieve my goal, no matter what it takes...and I'm sick of you girls getting in my way!" Decebal finally broke Anzu's chain of light and disappeared.

"I never did understand what King Ghislain saw in him," Moonbeam said.

"You said it," Lovebeam agreed.

"Who IS that guy?" Sorane asked.

"His name's Decebal. He's Zenjin's adoptive father," Riko told her as they turned back to normal.

"Urgh…" The girls turned around to find Chinami regaining consciousness. The fairies hid so Chinami wouldn't see them.

"Chi-chan!" Riko, Anzu, and Marina all ran to her aid. Chinami groaned as she rubbed her bandana covered head.

"Ouch...I feel like I just got hit by a truck…" Chinami groaned.

Riko couldn't resist the urge to glomp her. "Chi-chan! You're okay! Oh, thank goodness!" Riko cheered happily as she nuzzled the awake and alert but confused Chinami.

"Wait, didn't some green haired guy attack me just now?" Chinami asked.

"Yeah. He saw us there and he ran away. The police will get him," Anzu explained.

"He was pretty awful," Umi added.

Chinami smiled a little sadly. "I see…"

"What's wrong? You look sad," Riko asked with a concerned tone of voice.

Chinami sighed. "I'll never be smart or perfect at everything. Minako's smart and good at everything."

"We don't care. So what if you're not smart? Being smart isn't everything," Anzu said. "And nobody's perfect. I can't ride a bike, and I can't seem to stop breaking my ear buds for the life of me."

"Yeah. We like you because you're nice and friendly! And you like Moomins like me, and anybody who likes Moomins is awesome in my book!" Riko chirped sweetly.

Chinami could feel her chest be aglow with their love. She found herself near tears again, but this time out of joy. She wiped some out of the corners of her eyes. "Thank you, everyone…"

"Chinamiiiii!" A voice echoed in the air, prompting everyone to look around and see where it's coming from.

"That's Minako!" Chinami stood up, watching her bespectacled older sister run toward her and trap her in a hug.

"There you are! Thank goodness you're safe! You had me worried!" Minako exclaimed, her voice awash with relief. On impulse, Chinami clutched the back of her older sister's shirt, happy to be embraced by her warm, loving, sisterly arms.

"I'm sorry I'm so stupid…" Chinami muttered.

"What are you talking about? You're not stupid! Not at all! Dad shouldn't have been so hard on you. Come on. How about we watch an episode of The Spicy Sisters and then study for an hour," Minako told her lovingly as she helped her sister get back on her feet. Chinami nodded and the two sisters walked away, hand in hand.

Riko turned around and grabbed both Sorane and Umi's hands. "Welcome to the team, Cures Sealight and Skylight!"

Sorane flushed and looked away. "Th-Th-Thank you..."

"Does that mean you're not gonna be LuminousQ Pretty Cure anymore?" Moonbeam asked.

"There happen to be six individuals present, and since you girls used the Q to represent quartet or quintet, it cannot be used to represent six individuals," Starbeam asked.

"Wow! Talking fairies!" Umi leaped over to the fairies and squeezed them tightly. "Soooooo cute!"

"Hi there," Moonbeam chirped.

"Crushing...me..." Sunbeam choked out.

Some of the girls burst into laughter before Umi let them go. "Starbeam does raise a good point," Anzu added. "How about we just be Luminous Pretty Cure from now on?"

"I'm cool with that," Kyoya added. Everyone else agreed.

And thus, Luminous Pretty Cure has six people rounding out the set!


	34. Bonus 3: Arinao's Birthday!

Author's Note: This is just something I came up with on the spot, inspired by one of my favorite episodes of _Jewelpet Tinkle. _Don't worry! Nothing bad happens in this chapter! It's perfectly light and fluffy! Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 31.5: Novels of Memories! The Love Between Father and Daughter!

The summer is about to close its doors, and by September, there was a distinct chill in the air. Riko loves cool air, as she isn't too fond of feeling hot and sweaty under that oppressive summer heat. But the summer is more than just the end of heat waves, roses, and trips to the beach. It meant that autumn is opening it's yearly doors. The air is brilliantly clear and cool. Everywhere, leaves change from their dull green to colors that never cease to be amazing. The birches become a radiant golden yellow, almost blinding in direct sunlight. The giant oaks become a sober, majestic bronze. The maples come in many colors, from a warm, mandarin orange, to a blazing, fiery vermillion red. The air now has a frosty bite to it, no longer the soft, gentle breeze that would hug anyone who came into contact with it, but anyone with a taste for beauty knows to put on a warm sweater and come outside to welcome this annual miracle. They have to do it now, before the savage November winds strip the leaves off the trees and leave them bare.

However, some people are spending their autumn doing other things, like writing novels. Arinao sat in the den, his long, bulky fingers vigorously typing away like he had never done before. His eyes remained glued to the computer screen. As much as he'd like to go out for walks in the chilly autumn air, inspiration struck him like a lightning bolt, and he needed to let those ideas flow right out of him or else he may never get the chance to write it the way he wants to ever again. Finally, after about twenty minutes of vigorous writing, he saved his work and put it in a folder on his computer. With a sigh, he got up from his computer chair, poured himself a cup of coffee, and drank it as Saki gave Caroline her 5:00 PM meal, which is basically dry cat food.

"I'll start dinner in a minute, Ari," Saki told him.

"What are we having?" Arinao asked as he sipped some coffee.

"Meatloaf with corn, Spanish rice, and crescent rolls," Saki replied.

As Arinao was about to return to the den, he noticed Hikage at the dining room table, looking at a magazine. _'That's odd. He never reads magazines,'_ He thought. He peered over his son's shoulder. "What'cha doin'?"

"Whaaa!" Hikage stammered and stashed the magazine in his bookbag. "Oh! Nothing! Just looking at basketball stuff!"

"You ARE practicing, aren't you?"

"Of course I am! I better get that research paper done!" Hikage stammered as he took his book bag and ran to his room. Riko saw him run into his room and looked confused. Moonbeam sat on her shoulder contentedly.

"What's wrong, Niichan?" Riko asked as she came into his room.

"Hey, Ri-chan. Dad caught me reading this," Hikage said as he pulled the magazine out. She was about to ask what the big deal was until Hikage showed her a page of the magazine promoting the release of a new book. "You know Dad's birthday is next week, right? Well, I know how much he likes the works of Murakami Soseki, and her new novel is coming out tomorrow, so after school, I'm gonna ask Mom to take me to Books-A-Billion so I can buy it for him."

"Oh! His birthday IS coming up!" Riko exclaimed, clasping her little hands together.

"Don't tell Dad about this, okay?"

"You have my word!" Riko did a sailor's salute when she said this.

"Man, he's gonna love it!" Hikage exclaimed cheerfully, excited about being able to get his father a birthday present. "You should probably get or make him a present, too."

"Will do," Riko said before leaving her brother's bedroom. She went back to her room and plopped on her bed. "What AM I going to get him?"

"Do you know what he likes?" Moonbeam asked.

"Sort of. He likes books. Lots of books. But I don't know what genre he likes, like mystery or romance. I know he likes watching car races on TV. He also likes rock music from the seventies and eighties, but I forget which bands he likes. I could get him one of those tiny drums sets, but I don't know what stores sell them. I'll have to ask Mom later," Riko pondered out loud, wondering what she should get him.

"Try not to think too hard about it. You still have a week to go," Moonbeam said. "By the way, don't you have homework you need to do?"

"Oh! Thanks for reminding me!" Riko yelped as she hopped off the bed, got her homework out, and proceeded to work on it. "I better get this done!"

Riko finished her homework within the hour, but still worried about what she should get for Arinao's birthday next week. Later, she took a bath, blow dried her hair, put on her pajamas, and went to bed. But she couldn't go to sleep right off. Moonbeam checked the clock and it read 9:15 PM. "Can't sleep?" Moonbeam asked.

Riko sighed. "No. I can't seem to figure out what should I get him."

Moonbeam looked around Riko's room. Then she saw some papers scattered along Riko's floor, all full of written down fan fic ideas.

Wait…

"That's it!" Moonbeam chirped.

"What's it?" Riko sat up upon hearing Moonbeam yelp, still looking tired and weary. She wished she could just go to sleep already.

"You should write a novel!" Moonbeam suggested.

"Huuuh?" Riko couldn't believe she was hearing this from Moonbeam of all fairies. She buried herself in her blankets. "I can't write a real novel yet! There's still so much I can't do!"

"No no. I don't mean a real one. Just one for Arinao-san," Moonbeam clarified.

"I don't know. I love writing fan fics and all, but I don't think anyone will like them, Mom or Dad included. Besides, all I wanna write about are my own characters," Riko told her, not too keen on the idea.

But little Moonbeam isn't willing to give up. "You're worrying too much. I'm sure Arinao-san will love what you write. You wanna be a mangaka or a writer just like him, right? Maybe this'll be a good start! It doesn't have to be perfect," Moonbeam said.

Right then and there, a barrage of ideas began to flow into Riko's head. She could make Arinao the main character of her short novel. She could write about some of his experiences at home and write about how hard working he is, and how he always keeps a smile even when things are tough. "You're right! I'll start tomorrow morning when I wake up."

True to her word, Riko already began typing away, the ideas that hatched in her head flowing right out of her fingertips and into the Microsoft Word document she has up. Riko could see it now: she wrote about how nice Arinao is, how hard he works, how he dreams of writing, and how much he loves his family. Riko poured over this piece of literary prose for the entire week.

She didn't stop thinking about it even while at school. Sometimes, during classes, she would scribble down some ideas in the margins of her notebooks. But there's still things about him she doesn't know, so she decided not to go into detail about those. She doesn't want to get any facts wrong, plus she doesn't quite get how the adult world works. She did make sure to hang out with her friends during recess, and she told them all about her novel.

"Awww, how sweet!" Chinami crooned sweetly like she just saw a cute scene from a romance movie. "You're so nice, Ri-chan! I wish I could write stuff as well as you can. I never know what my parents like."

"Is your dad a novelist? Doesn't he have some books out?" Fukiko asked curiously while looking at her newly painted nails.

"Yep! He has two books out. Windy Egret and Bright Bloom," Riko explained.

"What a neat present for your dad," Anzu piped in. "I hear that self-made presents are much better than presents bought from a store."

"Some of the time, yes. I can't make anything for the life of me. I usually just make bead bracelets for my mom," Marina said with a smile. "But show us your novel sometime. We'd love to read it."

"It's nothing special. It's just me writing about how awesome Dad is. You'll probably think it's boring," Riko said sheepishly.

"It's gotta be better than the Twilight books, that's for sure," Kyoya said.

"You read those?" Fukiko asked curiously.

"A little bit. Hated it. Put it down after the second chapter. Couldn't stand it," Kyoya deadpanned, causing Anzu to laugh a bit.

"Yeah. They're pretty cheesy," Anzu agreed. "I may like vampires and wolves, but they just didn't do it for me."

"My mom'll freak if I even mention those books. She goes on and on and on about how they're poison that's made to corrupt the morals of impressionable teenagers and teaches them bad things and encourages unhealthy relationships and domestic violence. That's just what I've heard anyway. I wish she'd calm down a little," Fukiko explained with an exasperated tone of voice.

"That's pretty true from what I've heard," Marina said with a laugh.

"Anyway, you should go for it, Ri-chan," Kyoya said. "It doesn't have to be perfect. I wrote a really cheesy poem in English class for my dad since she likes poetry, and he liked it. I'm sure Arinao-san will like your little novel. I still find my poem pretty embarrassing!" He laughed a little after he said this.

"You should show me sometime. Maybe I can help make it less embarrassing," Riko said.

"Please do!" Kyoya said with another laugh.

"You should totally finish it, Ri-chan!" Chinami added. "I think your dad'll love it!"

"Thanks. I'll do that," Riko said sheepishly.

At their advice, Riko poured over her novel again, while making sure to leave time for dinner and homework. Other times, Arinao invited her out on walks through the neighborhood, watching the multicolored trees in awe. Moonbeam stayed with Riko throughout the week so she can offer tips on writing said novel. On one night, Moonbeam saw Arinao sitting in the den at 10:00 at night, still pouring over his own novel. She floated into the den at a low altitude, making sure he doesn't notice her. She froze the minute she heard the sounds of coughing. Arinao turned around to find Rina standing at the entrance of the den, in her fluffy orange pajamas, looking quite sick.

"Oh, Rina. Are you alright?" Arinao asked with worry as he kneeled in front of Rina, who kept a hand on her stomach.

"Dad...I don't feel so good…" Rina said. Arinao escorted her to the bathroom where Rina proceeded to vomit a couple times. After she finished, Arinao took her to the kitchen and made her a glass of water to drink. "Urgh…I hate being sick."

"I know how you feel," Arinao said before yawning and taking Rina to the living room.

It's here that Rina noticed that Arinao brought a little tiny notebook with him. Rina could see the edges of some pictures, piquing her childlike curiosity. "What's that?"

"Oh, you mean this?" Arinao pulled out his little notebook and opened it, pulling out some pictures. "I look at these whenever I feel sad or mad, and they make me happy again."

"Is that Riko?" Rina asked, noticing a picture of a young, possibly two year old Riko standing with another woman.

Arinao smiled. "Yes. This was taken when Riko was two. See this woman? This was Riko's therapist, Ukyo-san. You weren't born during this time, but once every three weeks, your mother and I would take Riko to this little building where she'd learn things from Ukyo-san. She was very good with her, and taught her lots of things."

"So, it's a school?"

"Not a school per se, but something similar. But she did have to go to school around that time, too. It was a special school for autistic children, and it was very good, but it was very far away, and she'd get on that bus with her little bottle and Saki would spend the day crying because she worried about her all the time. But Riko had to go. She wasn't hitting her developmental milestones, and we took her to the best therapists that we could find," Arinao explained. Rina looked through some more pictures. She saw one of a ten year old Hikage and a seven year old Riko sitting on a bench eating ice cream and looking very happy. Arinao smiled at that one. "That was when we first took them to Amano's. Do you remember that ice cream place? We used to go there a lot," Arinao explained.

"Yeah, I remember. I like their strawberry ice cream," Rina piped in. Then she saw a picture of herself as a four year old, wearing a very frilly princess-like dress and donning a big smile.

"Do you remember this, Rina? This was when you dressed up as Belle from Beauty and the Beast on Halloween that year. You ran out of the house to get candy, and Saki had to chase after you because it was so dark and other people were out there. She was afraid people might kidnap you," Arinao said with a laugh. Rina's face went red. Arinao put the picture away and gave Rina a slightly tight squeeze. "You know I love you, right?"

"Yes," Rina grumbled.

"I love all my kids very much. Now let's get you back to bed. If you're still sick in the morning, let me know. Okay?"

"Okay…"

Arinao carried Rina to her room and tucked her back into bed. Moonbeam returned to Riko's room at the same time, managing to go unnoticed. With that, a new morning came, and Riko still poured over her novel. This time, Riko had another idea. "I know! I should add some pictures!" Riko exclaimed as she decided to draw some pictures on empty pages, like Arinao working on his novel at his desk. Riko isn't sure if he'll come out right, but it'll be better than nothing. At one point, Riko even woke up at 6:00 AM just so she could work on it. Finally, the day before Arinao's birthday…

"I'm finally done!" Riko exclaimed happily as she held the printed, double-sided papers in her hands.

"Awesome! Now all we need to do is bind it, and I know someone who can help with that," Moonbeam said as she gently took Riko's papers.

"Who?" Riko asked.

"I'll be right back! I promise I'll be careful with your novel, okay?" Moonbeam said as she flew out the window. Riko had to get ready for school, so she decided to trust Moonbeam and not worry about it.

* * *

As it turns out, the person-or in this case, fairy-that Moonbeam is going to have bind Riko's book is none other than Starbeam! Moonbeam found Starbeam at Hotaru's house and told her everything. Starbeam found herself delighted. "Ohhh, what a lovely, magnanimous person Riko is for making this novel from scratch for her dear father!" Starbeam chirped, touched by Riko's gesture.

"I know. Anyway, you know how to bind books, right? I was wondering if maybe you could work on this one. Is that okay?" Moonbeam asked politely as she handed the papers to the beaming Starbeam.

"Of, but of course! I'd be more than happy to bind it for you. It shouldn't take too long. It's quite an easy process, and I happen to have some materials in my bow clip perfect for binding it," Starbeam took the papers and touched her blow clip. A pack of Elmer's glue popped out, along with a large pile of fabric. "When I'm finished, I'll inform you. Alright?"

"Thanks! I'm counting on you!" Moonbeam said cheerfully before leaving.

True to her word, Starbeam went to work on binding Riko's book. She's helped her mother bind broken books before, so as of now, Starbeam has become quite good at the craft. It took her about two or so hours to put the book together. But by dinnertime, Starbeam managed to finish the book. She carried it out of Hotaru's house, flying to Riko's house to give it to Moonbeam. When the blue fairy knocked on Riko's bedroom window, Riko saw her and opened it.

"Hi Starbeam! What are you doing here?" Riko asked with delight. Moonbeam found herself smiling with anticipation.

"Salutations, Riko-chan. Moonbeam asked me to bind this for you. I do hope I didn't unknowingly tarnish it in any way," Starbeam told her as she handed her newly bound book to her. Riko couldn't believe it. Something she wrote has actually been bound into a real book! The fabric that keeps the book together is light baby blue in color, firm and sturdy, hard enough for someone to add some final touches to it.

"It's beautiful, Starbeam! I didn't know you could bind books! Thank you so much! I'm gonna add some finishing touches, if you don't mind," Riko exclaimed happily, her eyes twinkling brightly with unadulterated gratitude, completely awestruck by how good it looks. Starbeam blushed and scratched one of her round ears sheepishly.

"You're very welcome. I'm happy to have done my task well. I do hope your father likes it," Starbeam said.

"How about you stay for dinner? Saki's ordering a pizza!" Moonbeam suggested.

"Hmm...I don't care for pizza very much, but it would be rude to decline your invitation, so I suppose I can remain here for the time being," Starbeam replied.

"I love pizza, but only with cheese on it. I don't like it if it has toppings," Riko said.

"Me too," Moonbeam agreed.

Once they had their pizza, Riko worked on some finishing touches. She drew some things on some paper, grabbed some scissors, and cut them out. With a glue stick, she glued them on the front of the book. Finally, the book is completely finished! Riko drew a cute picture of a smiling Arinao's face, along with the words _'Thank You, Dad!'_ on the top, and the words _'A Book By Tasogare Riko,'_ on the bottom. With a light heart full of accomplishment, Riko went to bed, lost in cloudland, with Moonbeam right next to her.

Riko went about Arinao's birthday like usual. It's a school day, so she has to do what she usually does: go to school, learn, hang out with her friends, and write down her homework assignments. But she couldn't wait to go back home and wrap Arinao's present in wrapping paper. The day seemed to go on forever. Finally, when the bell rang, Riko wasted no time bouncing in the back seat of Saki's car. Much to her surprise, the house has a sign on the living room ceiling that says 'Happy Birthday, Dad!' written on it in marker of all colors of the rainbow. Not only that, Hikage is putting his presents on the dining room table, all perfectly wrapped. Rina put hers on the table too. Saki proceeded to both put her own present on the table and get the birthday cake out of the refrigerator.

"Mom? Do you know where the wrapping paper is?" Riko asked.

"Did you look in the basement?" Saki asked back.

Without an answer, Riko ran down the basement, grabbed a heap of wrapping paper, and ran to her room. With the scissors from last night, she cut out a chunk of wrapping paper and tried to wrap it like Saki tried to teach her. Unfortunately, it didn't come out too smoothly, even with Moonbeam's help. "Sorry. I'm not good at wrapping presents," Moonbeam told her apologetically.

"Me either. I don't mind," Riko said as she taped some wrapping paper together. "Oh! I need a ribbon! I think they're downstairs," Riko let Moonbeam slip in her pocket, took her sloppily wrapped present, ran down in the basement again, and looked for the gift ribbons Saki would always buy at Christmas. After some searching, she managed to find a big bag of it. She pulled out a green one, because she knows that green is Arinao's favorite color. She had a bit of trouble sticking it on despite pressing on it as hard as she could. After a while, the ribbon finally stayed on the present. It's ready for giving!

"Oh! Ari, you're home early!"

Home early? Riko found herself with a radiant smile on her face. Now's a good time to give it to him! She ran up the stairs, unable to wait any longer. She had to give it to him. She's worked so hard on it. Surely he'll be happy...but the problem is, he didn't come home happy, which made Riko stop, her smile fading away.

"Ugh! Can't anyone give me some space in here?!" Arinao roared, his face contorting with anger, beaded with sweat. Hikage and Rina are in the dining room, completely confused and frightened. Riko's so frozen in place she couldn't even cover her own ears, even though the sound of his yelling is ripping her ear drums apart.

"What's the matter, Ari? Are you having an anxiety attack again?" Saki asked with concern.

"Oh, why do you care?! I've had a rough day, and I don't want to put up with your whining about the dishes or the laundry yet again!" Arinao roared louder this time. He was about to leave until he saw Riko at the top of the steps.

With a tomato red face absolutely wet with fresh tears, eyes overflowing with fright and sadness. Just the sight of this made Arinao stop yelling.

"Riko…"

"We work so hard for your birthday...and the first thing you do is...yell…" Riko whimpered, her sobbing evolving into a full on wail. "I can't believe you!" With that, Riko dropped her sloppily wrapped present and ran out the door in tears.

"Riko! Wait!" Hikage ran after her, but she was already far from the house so he wound up stopping.

Arinao facepalmed. He wished he hadn't said anything. He looked down at the sloppily wrapped present she dropped and picked it up. How could he have been so cruel, even though he's not really angry at her, just having an anxiety attack? He clutched the present in his hand. He knew what he had to do. "I'll go look for Riko," Arinao told Saki before running out the door after her.

* * *

Riko ran down the street with tears running down her face, with more coming out because of how bright everything around her is. Just about everything flashed light in her eyes. Some glass wind chimes, some cars. Riko wished the sun would just go away and hide behind some clouds. Soon, Riko found herself in the park where the guinea pig CS attacked it long ago. She found an opening in between some bushes and sat right in between it. She wanted to pull her legs to her chest and hold them, but she can't stay still like that for too long, and it hurts, so she just sat there, letting the tears flow. She covered her ears, even though there isn't any loud noise. She squeezed her eyes shut and wished she was somewhere else.

"I hate yelling," Riko muttered to herself. "I hate, hate, hate, hate it!" She stamped her foot on the grass, even though she's only sitting. She took a piece of grass and just threw it, watching the blades float gently back down. "Even when I do something nice, I get yelled at…"

"I'm sure he didn't mean it. He probably just had a hard day at work," Moonbeam reasoned.

"But I have bad days at school and I don't come home and yell at people the minute I walk through the door!" Riko snapped. Moonbeam's ears drooped downward. Then it hit her.

"Oh! Hang on, Ri-chan! I'll be right back!" Moonbeam yelped as she floated away from the park. _'Riko needs time to calm down a little. I better get that notebook!'_ Moonbeam thought as she saw Riko's house come within her vicinity. One of the windows is open a crack, so she flew right in, walked into the den, and found Arinao's little notebook. She grabbed it and flew out the window again.

* * *

After many agonizing minutes of searching, Arinao plopped on a bench and brushed his hands through his hair, already regretting letting his anxiety get the better of him. He wished he had just kept his mouth shut. "I can't believe I yelled at Riko. She doesn't deserve that...and everyone else even threw me a party...I need to stop taking my anger out on people like this…" Arinao took some deep breaths, hoping it'll calm him down a bit.

Then he looked down at the present Riko dropped. It's very sloppily wrapped, and the ribbon came right off, but he didn't mind. He gently undid the tape and pulled the wrapping paper apart, but not to the point of ripping it. When he finally opened it, his eyes went wide, and his mouth fell open a little bit. Already, his previous anger began to fade away. He couldn't believe what he saw.

* * *

"Ri-chan!" Moonbeam cried out as she flew back into the park. Riko's still in the same spot, but she's calmer now.

"What is it?" Riko asked.

Moonbeam handed her the notebook. "This is Ari-san's. Take a look inside."

Confused, Riko took the little notebook and opened it. There are little scribbles here and there. Some pictures fell out. Riko looked at them. There are quite a lot of pictures: A two-year-old Riko playing with a woman she doesn't remember. Ten-year-old Hikage and seven-year-old Riko eating ice cream on a bench. Four year old Rina dressed as Belle from Beauty and the Beast on Halloween. Arinao and eight-year-old Riko sitting in a park, watching the orange sky don streaks of pink, purple, and blue. That last picture made Riko unlock a memory she thought she hid in the back of her mind.

(flashback)

_An eight-year-old Riko sat next to her father, watching the orange sky paint itself with streaks of soft pink, blue, and purple. "Pwetty!" Riko crooned, reaching her little hands out as though she wants to grab that colorful sky. Arinao smiled._

"_The sky is beautiful, isn't it?" Arinao asked._

"_Does it get painted?" Riko asked back._

"_Huh?"_

"_You said God created the world. Is he an artist? Does he paint the sky whenever it's sunrise or sunset? Because the sky is only supposed to be one color! Blue! Day and night!"_

_Arinao laughed a little, perplexed by her logic. "Not really. But it does look like it could be painted, doesn't it?"_

"_But I like drawing best. Paint is too messy and sticky," Riko piped in before standing up and throwing her fist into the sky. "When I grow up, I'm gonna be a...a mangaka! I'm gonna draw story books and make everybody happy!" She shouted._

"_Oh, you are, aren't you?" Arinao said before wrapping his arms around the girl, heaping her on his lap, and subjecting her to some friendly txxxxx torture. Riko flailed her little legs up and down and laughed merrily, right along with her loving father._

"_Quit it, Dad!"_

"_Make me, my little Salvador Dali!"_

"_I'm not a doll! I'm a person!"_

_After a short while of some friendly father-daughter fun, Arinao stopped and let Riko go. Riko smoothed out her shirt and sat back on the grass. "Riko. I know things have been hard these past few months. But I want you to listen to me. Things may be hard now, but it will get better. Maybe not right now. Not next week, maybe not even next year. But things will get better. The world isn't a mean place, and there are just as many nice people on it as there are mean people," Arinao told her solemnly. "Someday, you'll find friends, and we can go to nice places together and do things like this. Or when you grow up and graduate high school, we can find good colleges for you to go to. College is like school, but it's much easier and nicer. You can take whatever classes you want, and people are more mature and understanding."_

"_Is college grown up school?" Riko asked innocently._

"_You can put it that way, yes."_

"_Did you go to grown up school?"_

"_I did. I liked it, and I made many friends, some of whom I still keep in touch with. What I'm saying is, Riko, is that people go through both bad and good things. The bad may seem overwhelming, but you should never give up or think there's no good in the world. In fact, many good people have been through bad things. For example, have you heard of Hans Christian Andersen?"_

"_Who's that?"_

"_He wrote stories like The Little Mermaid and The Ugly Duckling. He didn't have a very good life at first. He couldn't read, his teachers didn't like him, and everyone said he should give up writing. But he didn't. He never believed the mean things they said about him. Now, he's one of the most famous writers ever, and everyone loves his stories now. Riko, I don't want you to ever give up. Don't believe the mean things people say."_

_Riko looked to the sky again. The midnight blue is creeping in. "I'll try."_

(end flashback)

"Oh. I remember. Back at my old town, Dad and I would go places and watch the sunset change the sky's colors before bed," Riko mused, still looking at the picture in her hands. "We don't...do it anymore because Dad works during the day…" Some more tears creeped out, but Riko didn't bother wiping them away. "He's done so much for me...and I'm here right now because of him and Mom…"

"I'm sure Ari-san feels bad about yelling at you. I bet even he has bad days and has doubts. I know my parents do. My dad is often busy with helping people since he's a doctor, and I often overhear him worry about how he wishes he could spend more time with us. I've seen my mom worry about whether she's a good parent or not, but they've always helped me and my sisters through thick and thin," Moonbeam told her. "Don't lose faith in Ari-san, Riko-chan."

"I won't. I never lost faith in him. I'm just so sick of people yelling all the time," Riko replied as she put the picture back in the notebook.

"Riko!" Riko looked up to find Arinao running right toward her with a very relieved look on his face. Moonbeam scrambled into Riko's pocket with the notebook in hand. The angry, contorted face he had is completely gone now. Once he came within her vicinity, he wrapped her in his large arms. "Oh, thank goodness you're alright!"

Riko wrapped her own arms around him silently. After reaffirming each other's safety, Arinao released Riko, donning a very remorseful expression. "I'm sorry I flipped out back there. I really shouldn't have, especially when you and everyone else threw that party for me," Arinao whimpered.

"It's okay," Riko replied with a smile. Then she noticed the book in Arinao's hand.

The book she made for him.

Her face turned redder than a tomato.

"You...didn't read that...did you?" Riko stammered, looking like she's about to burst.

"I did. I can't believe you went through all the trouble to make this for me," Arinao said gratefully before hugging Riko again. "I feel so blessed to have such wonderful children. I'm the happiest father in the world right now."

"You...like it?"

"Of course I do! I read the whole thing in one go! Why wouldn't I? I never knew you saw me in this light, Riko. But how did you get it bound?"

"Uh…" Riko felt bad about lying to her father, as she's usually a truthful person, but she couldn't tell him that Starbeam did it. He wouldn't believe her, and she didn't want to make them attract unwanted attention. "An-chan knows someone who binds books and she gave it to him to bind."

"Awww! That's so sweet of her! We ought to thank her sometime."

"I plan to."

"But seriously, Riko. This is one of the best presents I've ever gotten in my life. Did I ever tell you I love you? Because you know I do."

"I love you too, Dad."

"Let's go home now."

"Yes. Let's."

With that, father and daughter walked back home, hand in hand. Now that the craziness is over, the entire Tasogare family celebrated Arinao's birthday. They ate strawberry shortcake together, relished in the presents, and made another happy memory.

Which wound up inspiring Arinao to write yet another novel.

Inspired, he ran to his computer after the festivities and typed like he never typed before. He even came up with a title for it right on the spot: _My Novel For My Father_.


	35. Hopes and Secrets

Chapter 32: A Wonderful Winter! Hopes and Secrets!

Sorane and Umi couldn't believe their luck. Not only did the Minamigawas let them stay at their house for however long they wished, when the trees began to adopt their brilliant autumn colors, Sorane found herself with a job! A small, part time job at Hikaribashi Elementary School as a lunch lady, but it was better than nothing. Not only that, the pay was decent enough. Sorane couldn't believe that fortune was smiling down on her like this.

Umi's luck changed, too. Her babysitting job proved to be another good source of income, and she liked playing with the kids. She made sure to maintain her good study habits and continue her schoolwork, but even she noticed that things were looking up. Not only that, Sorane became less and less irritable, very slowly returning to her old self. Sorane became more appreciative and smiled more. Umi was relieved.

Then, before the first snow began to fall, the Minamigawas surprised Sorane and Umi with heavenly news. "Sorane-chan. Umi-chan. We have great news for you," Sojiro told her at the dinner table one day.

"What is it?" Sorane asked as she ate a piece of warm, fluffy meat loaf. Umi was too busy eating some corn to pay attention.

"We've been working on a lot of things since you've arrived," Sojiro began with a radiant smile. "And we're pleased to announce that...the court gave us custody of you two. Welcome to the family, Sorane and Umi. You're our new adopted daughters."

Sorane and Umi both did a double take. The corn practically fell right out of Umi's mouth, right back onto her playe. "What?!"

"You heard him!" Kyouichi happily wrapped his arm around the sheepish Sojiro and pulled him toward him like they're best buds in high school. "We worked real hard to get the court to agree to give you to us since no kid deserves to live on the streets. Best of all, Sorane-chan, we contacted Hikaribashi High School so we could arrange for you to go back there again, and you will! You'll have to repeat your senior year, but you'll get to graduate!"

Sorane dropped a fork full of meatloaf, completely ignoring the clattering sound it made on the floor. She could not prevent the ungraceful dropping of her jaw. She and Umi were adopted now? And she gets to go back to school and graduate? True, it'll mean she'll have to quit her part time job, but she saved up the money she got from that.

Sorane thought this was a dream at first, a fantastical illusion meant to trick her into believing that she has happiness only for the hands of fate to take it away and make her feel even worse despair than before. But no, this is no dream. Sorane could feel warm water drip down her face, and she could hear herself whimpering out loud. She buried her face in her hands. Umi smiled and hugged her tightly.

"Isn't this great, Sorane?! We have a house again!" Umi cried triumphantly, shedding some tears of her own.

"Oh my gosh! Are you okay?" Hotaru asked worriedly. "Don't be sad!"

"No! I'm not sad!" Sorane wailed. "I...I...I...Why would you do all of this for us? You...you don't even know us…do we even deserve all of this?"

"Of course you do!" Sojiro exclaimed. "Nobody deserves to live on the streets, and you've been through enough despair. There's nothing wrong with helping someone out, right?"

Sorane found herself speechless. How could she possibly put her feelings in words at this point? "I...I...How can I ever...thank you…?"

"Just be yourself. That's how. You're our family now. Besides, Hotaru's always wanted a sister," Kyouichi told her, flashing a big smile.

Sorane wiped some of her tears away with her hands and flashed a big smile, even though some still managed to creep out. "Thank you...so so much…"

"Sorane!" Umi hugged Sorane tightly. Her older sister wrapped her arms around her so tight she didn't want to let go. "We don't have to live on the streets anymore!" Sobs escaped from Umi's mouth.

"I know...I know..." They still couldn't believe it. They could actually close the bad chapter of their lives and start a brand new one. A good one, where they could resume their normal lives.

"Does this mean Sorane and Umi are my sisters now?" Hotaru asked curiously.

"It would seem so," Sojiro clarified.

"Yay!" Umi let go of Sorane and jumped on a surprised Hotaru. "Now I have two big sisters! This is awesome!"

Hotaru forced a smile. She was happy to be able to help Sorane and Umi. They deserved it after all they went through. But Umi's words dawned on her like a fire alarm. She had sisters now. No longer was she an only child.

* * *

King Ghislain and a few other friends of his were sitting in a room full of towers of books and papers, working hard to decipher the archives they retrieved from the library. "Wow...I never knew any of this about our ancestors…" Jervis said as he wrote some things down on some paper. "They even gave us visuals on how to decipher them if we needed them!"

"I know. We're lucky," King Ghislain said as he read some more scrolls.

"Here's one on how the Light Bringers and Heart Lighters are made!" Elphaba piped in, showing them the scroll and everything she wrote down on a separate piece of paper.

"Wonderful! Mal would love to hear about this," King Ghislain said as he looked over everything Elphaba wrote down. Elphaba herself scurried away to find some more scrolls that needed deciphering.

"Do be careful with the books. Who knows how fragile they are since they've been untouched for years," One man piped in.

"I'm being as careful as I can, Sheik," Another woman told him.

However, as everyone else was deciphering the archives, King Ghislain focused on the paper that Elphaba gave him regarding the Heart Lighters and Light Bringers. He couldn't believe what he was reading. His eyes widened, but not to the point of making him fearful or shocked. But truth be told, he is certainly surprised. "So these are the requirements for a Pretty Cure…" He mused to himself.

"Oh! I found one on Pretty Cure!" Another woman exclaimed, writing down her findings on another piece of paper.

"Ugh! My eyes feel like they're going to fall out!" Another woman complained, causing everyone but Ghislain to burst into laughter.

"We feel you, Nessarose," Elphaba piped in through her laughter. King Ghislain stood up and walked out of the room.

Jervis took notice. "Where are you going, Your Majesty?"

No answer.

* * *

On one weekend during winter break, Lovebeam, Kyoya, and his parents all decided to go to Chiba prefecture for a three day vacation. All they really did there was check into a hotel, go sight seeing, and have fun. Since the weather had grown cold, they didn't get to do things like go to the beach, but they didn't mind. The Mitomos just wanted some time off together. On the second day of their trip, Jiroemon, Kayoko, Kyoya, and Lovebeam (who remained hidden in Kyoya's jacket) walked past the beach.

"I am NEVER eating futomaki sushi ever again!" Kayoko exclaimed with a laugh.

"I'm surprised you don't like it. You usually love seafood," Jiroemon said.

"I know! It's just so big and spicy! I knew I couldn't finish it," Kayoko replied.

"The sea is beautiful," Lovebeam said, noticing the pristine ocean from afar. They were a little far from the beach, but the view was still good enough for them to see the ocean reach right up to the sky.

"Do you have beaches on Rozaniela?" Kyoya whispered.

"We have some. I don't really like swimming, though. It ruins my fur, and I can't swim to save my life," Lovebeam replied. "But the fish in the oceans are wonderful! There's rainbow fish, glow in the dark sharks, gold dolphins, sea ponies, and we even have mermaids and hippocampi! Those are half fish half horse."

'_Oh! Like in Hinata Sun Child! I am SO gonna tell Riko about this when we get home!'_ Kyoya thought. "You oughta show me some time."

"Who are you talking to, Kyoya?" Jiroemon asked.

Lovebeam ducked in his coat pocket. "Just myself," Kyoya replied sheepishly with a chuckle. Jiroemon smiled and continued walking with Kayoko by his side.

As he rolled behind his parents, he noticed a young woman across the street. The woman looked to be in her late twenties, with orange hair tied in a low ponytail, wearing a pink and gray striped sweater, black jeans, and tan uggs. He didn't pay much attention to her, but she seemed to be paying a lot of attention to him. All of a sudden, the woman ran up to them like she wanted to get their attention. Everyone stopped when the woman came up to them.

"Can we help you?" Kayoko asked politely as the woman caught her breath.

"Yuu...Yuu...Yuusuke?" The woman choked out.

'_Yuusuke?!'_ Kayoko gasped a little when she heard that name. Jiroemon's eyes simply widened. Kyoya just cocked his head to one side, looking flummoxed. Something just didn't seem quite right.

"Sorry. I think you got me confused. My name's Kyoya, not Yuusuke," Kyoya told her in a casual, straightforward manner.

The woman calmed down a bit but looked disappointed. "Oh. I see. I'm sorry. I mistook you for someone else. You look so much like a little boy who lived across from my mother's house," The woman explained.

Kayoko couldn't hold in the urge to ask. "This Yuusuke...tell us about him."

"Kayoko!" Jiroemon exclaimed.

"I don't know very much about him, but my mother lives over there," The woman pointed toward the street, pointing to a row of houses. "She lives in a brick house. The boy lived in a rusty white house right across from it. It's condemned now. But when I went to visit her five or six years ago, I heard yelling and crying coming from it. I went to see what was up, and I saw a woman in a backyard beating and yelling at the poor child."

Kayoko's hands flew to her mouth. Jiroemon put his hands on her shoulder. "Kayoko. She must be referring to another child. Yuusuke is a common name. They might not be the same person."

"What happened next? Did you do something about it?" Kyoya asked loudly.

"Umm…" The woman stammered. "I did ask my mother about it, and she says it was an everyday occurrence. But I bought a tape recorder and tried to record it so I could report it to the police and give them solid evidence. But the woman kicked me off her property and stole the tape."

"What did this woman look like? Did you get her name?" Kyoya added again.

"Can we please change the subject?" Jiroemon asked, but everyone ignored him.

"Not her name, no. My mother's terrible with names. But the woman had long, scraggly brown hair, brown eyes, and was extremely overweight-" The woman explained before Kayoko cut her off, and not in a very pleasant way.

"This has been happening and you didn't bother to tell the police anyway?!" Kayoko roared. Jiroemon held her back. "That might have been my son! And you didn't even bother to help him!"

"Kayoko! Calm down! Let's be rational about this!" Jiroemon tried to calm her down, but Kayoko is just too ticked off to listen to him. The frazzled woman took a few steps back frightfully, her eyes becoming a pool of remorse. All of a sudden, Kayoko broke out of his grasp and stormed off. Jiroemon followed her.

Kyoya didn't leave just yet. He smiled at the woman. "Thanks for the info. We really appreciate it. What's the address of the house?"

"213 Ai Avenue," The woman replied.

"Thanks," Kyoya replied before rolling off. As the woman found herself alone, she began sobbing. She buried her face in her hands as tears came rolling out of her blue eyes.

'_She's right. She's absolutely right. I should have done more...'_ The woman thought through her tears.

* * *

At the Hikaribashi Police Station, a gruffy looking man sat at a desk, looking over some case files with a strawberry pocky sticking out of his mouth. He has flat black hair, blue eyes, thick eyebrows, and a small, shaggy beard decorating his chin, with remnants of a small mustache forming in between his nose and mouth. He was wearing a brown jacket over a gray sweater, black jeans, and brown leather shoes. He looked through some case files but noticed someone leaning over his cubicle.

"Hey! Pocky lover!" A younger man exclaimed, drawing the older man out of his file. "Good work today."

"Thanks, Iwakura," The older man replied.

"You gonna go home yet, Fukasaku?" Iwakura asked.

Fukasaku shook his head. "Not yet. There are still some things I need to take a look at."

"I see," Iwakura said. Then he noticed a picture of a baby taped to Fukasaku's computer. "Is that your kid? Cute!"

"Oh. You mean this?" Fukasaku took the picture off his computer. "No. This isn't my child. It's someone else's. Are you familiar with the infant kidnapping at Shining Light hospital fifteen years ago?"

"I've heard of it, but not much."

Fukasaku looked down at the picture with a sad look on his face. "This baby was stolen from that hospital. I was a new detective on the case back then. We searched high and low for this kid, all over the nation, but we came up empty. Everyone says it's a lost cause, but every day I think about this kid and wonder what's happened to him. Sometimes I even go through the file and see if I missed anything."

"You're really devoted to that case, aren't you?" Iwakura asked.

Fukasaku nodded. "I haven't given up. His family deserves closure, and I won't stop until I get something. Anything."

"If you need help, I'll be more than happy to be of assistance."

Fukasaku laughed a bit. "I appreciate it, Iwakura."

All of a sudden, the phone next to him rang, sending him into a slight shock. "Hey! Your phone never rings!"

"Oh, be quiet you," Fukasaku grumbled before answering it. "This is the Hikaribashi police department."

"_Fukasaku-san! It's me, Kayoko! Yuusuke's mother!"_ Kayoko's voice shouted on the other line.

"Whoa whoa whoa. Slow down, Mitomo-san-"

"_I have some information about Yuusuke! You need to hear this!"_

"Calm down first, Mitomo-san. Tell me everything," Fukasaku told her calmly.

Kayoko told him about their encounter with the woman, the description of the condemned house, the description of the other woman who was supposedly abusing the boy, and the address, 213 Ai Avenue. She also told him the name of the neighborhood the house was in. "I see. I'm glad you found something after all these years. I'll go and see if I can get anything. Thank you. Bye," With that, he hung up the phone. "Actually, Iwakura, would you like to go on a trip with me later on?"

"Sure! Where are we going?" Iwakura exclaimed excitedly.

"This little neighborhood in Chiba called Aida."

A few days later, detectives Fukasaku and Iwakura arrived in the neighborhood in question, Aida. It was a relatively small little town. Not very well known, but with the way Fukasaku saw everyone interacting with each other, it seemed to be a tight knit community. Soon, both detectives found themselves in front of a rusty old white house. All of the windows had dark blue shutters on both sides, there was a large shrub next to it, and on the front door was a yellow piece of paper that read _'This building is condemned by building inspector. Unfit for human inhabitation. 500,000 yen fine for removing this notice!'_ The grass around it was very tall, stretching so high that it bent forward. Nobody had mowed it for years. Some tiles on the roof were missing, and there were cobwebs on the porch and the walls. Iwakura found himself clutching his dark green coat.

"I gotta hand it to ya, Kogoro. I don't know how you were able to get permission from the boss and get that warrant," Iwakura said.

"I've been a detective for fifteen years. I know how the system works," Kogoro told him. "You go ask around the neighborhood. I'll take a look around here."

"Right!" Iwakura did a salute and left the premises.

A nonchalant Kogoro opened the door (wearing latex gloves) and walked into the house. As of now, the house was mostly empty, save for some decrepit furniture, like a blue couch covered with lacerations with stuffing protruding from them. A table in the dining room had been snapped in half. One of its legs had come off. He went into another room and saw a decrepit bedroom. The bed sheet on the bed had holes in it, probably from mice, and the bureau had some drawers missing. Kogoro decided to pull out the drawers and see what was inside. At first, he rummaged through them and found nothing but moth eaten clothes, socks, and underwear, and the inside of the drawers definitely smelled like mothballs.

However, when he went through another drawer, something hard rattled in it. He pulled some old clothes out, only to find a tape recorder stashed underneath. Since Kayoko mentioned that the woman's tape recorder was taken from her, he assumed this might be the one. He pulled it out and put it in a plastic bag. He flashed a smile.

'_Finally, something that might lead us to the culprit, whoever she is!'_ He thought as he put the plastic bag in his coat pocket and left the house. To be honest, he just wanted to get away from that awful moth ball smell.

Once he got out of the house, he found Iwakura running up to him. "Hey, Kogoro! I got somethin'!"

"What is it?" Kogoro asked once Iwakura caught up.

"I've been talkin' to some people around here, and someone named Katsunuma Mana used to live here with her daughter, Chisa. But some years ago her daughter ran away, and from what I hear, she died later on. I'm gonna see if I can find some hospital records with that name," Iwakura told him.

Kogoro's eyes widened. Katsunuma Mana. The name of the woman who once lived in this condemned house. He smiled widely. Finally. A name. Someone they can zoom in on. Now that they have a name, they could try searching for her.

But even though they finally hada lead, it won't be easy telling the Mitomos about this, especially when Kogoro went to the station and listened to the tape.

* * *

A few days after that, Kyoya sat in the living room making bottle rockets when he heard a knock on the door. "Coming!" He got in his wheelchair, rolled to the front door, and answered it.

It was Kogoro. At first, he looked confused, like he thought he was at the wrong address, but he masked his concern and smiled. "Hello there. Is this the Mitomo residence by any chance?"

"Yes it is," Kyoya replied.

"Are your parent-WHOA!" He was about to ask if his parents are home until he found something ram against him gently. He turned around to find a St. Bernard sitting behind him.

Kyoya burst into laughter. "Hondo's up to his old tricks again! He's my neighbor's dog. He's super friendly and loves people, but he thinks he's little."

"You don't say…" Kogoro got up and pet the happy St. Bernard. Soon, Natsuko came and took him back. At this point, both Kayoko and Jiroemon arrived at the front door.

"Oh my goodness...detective Fukasaku…" Jiroemon couldn't believe it. Kogoro brushed his coat a bit and cleared his throat.

"Hello, Kayoko. Jiroemon. I didn't know you had another child," Kogoro said.

"Yes. This is Kyoya," Kayoko introduced him to Kogoro. Kyoya politely bowed before him.

"Hi," Kyoya said.

"Can I come in? We found something regarding Yuusuke...but you're not going to like it," Kogoro said grimly. Kayoko wasted no time inviting him in and preparing him a cup of tea. Everyone gathered at the dining table. The anticipation was killing them. When he finished his tea, he pulled a small, black, handheld tape recorder out of his pocket, gently putting it on the table.

"That's a tape recorder," Kyoya said.

"Yes. The story you heard from the woman is true," Kogoro began. "First off, I do have some good news for you. We searched around that neighborhood, and as it turns out, we have a potential suspect. Her name is Katsunuma Mana, and was well known around the neighborhood for being very superstitious and short tempered. We have no solid evidence confirming that she really did kidnap a child or whether or not it was your child. But we at least have a lead. Unfortunately…" This is when Kogoro turned grim. "The contents of this tape are...horrifying, to put it mildly."

"Did you listen to it?" Jiroemon asked.

"Yes. You're welcome to listen to it, but you'll be aghast by what Mana did to the child," Kogoro told him grimly.

Kayoko squeezed her left wrist with her right hand, and her eyes grew a bit. She didn't like the implications behind that sentence. But she pressed her lips together before speaking. "Play the tape. Whether it's Yuusuke or not, I want to...at least hear his voice...if it really is him."

"Me too," Kyoya added.

"But we don't even know if it's him or not. He might not even be alive!" Jiroemon exclaimed.

"Very well. But do prepare yourselves," Kogoro said.

Reluctantly, he pressed the play button. At first, it started off very staticy, but it soon evolved into real human voices. Kogoro was right in that they'd be aghast at the tape's contents. It began with a high pitched scream from a young child, some object shattering, and the roars of a woman.

"_YOU'RE GONNA PAY FOR EATING MY LUNCH!"_ Just the sound of that woman's gravely roar made Kyoya cover his ears. Lovebeam listened from the other room, and she squeezed her long ears tight against herself, but because they were so long and sensitive, she still heard the horrible recording. She wished her ears were short like Starbeam's.

Then a thud. Many slap noises. Kyoya cringed with every slap sound he heard. Jiroemon's hands flew to his mouth, but Kayoko's eyes kept on getting wider and wider. _"Stop! No! Please!"_ The child in the recording pleaded desperately. But his pleas went unheard.

"_I wish you were NEVER BORN!"_ The woman roared. More slap sounds. _"YOU'RE A CURSE! I HATE YOU! YOU TOOK MY DAUGHTER AWAY!"_ More slap sounds followed. They seemed to go on forever until they suddenly stopped. _"Hey! What do you think you're doing?!"_

"_Oh no!" _The voice of another woman exclaimed. The same woman that the Mitomos encountered on their family trip just recently.

"_I'm gonna-!"_ With that, the recording stopped.

Kayoko felt sick. For real. As soon as the tape stopped, she dashed for the bathroom and vomited right into the toilet. The repulsive smell consumed the bathroom, but she didn't care. Jiroemon left the dining room and watched as Kayoko puked a few more times in the toilet, his heart going out to her. She finished puking, but it didn't make her feel better. Jiroemon kneeled before her, giving her the chance to glomp him and wrap her arms around him tightly. She cried into his chest, without any intent on stopping.

"Yuusuke...all this time...he's been going through all that...and I couldn't save him! I'm a failure as a mother!" Kayoko wailed in her frazzled but worried husband's chest. Jiroemon wanted to contradict her, tell her that the boy might not even be their Yuusuke. Maybe it was someone else. But it still broke his heart to see Kayoko so sad, so broken, so completely awash with horror, all because of that woman.

Even Kyoya couldn't help but roll toward the bathroom entrance, his own heart going out to his mother. He saw her get sad before, but never to this extent. Now he wished he hadn't heard that recording. _'So...my brother's been spending his life being abused by some crazy psycho lady?'_ Kyoya thought sadly. Not wanting to see his mother cry, he turned around and looked at Kogoro. "You are going to find this Katsunuma person and put her in jail, right?"

"Yes. We will do everything in our power to find her and put her to justice," Kogoro told him.

"The inner sociopath in me wishes death on her," Kyoya muttered grimly.

The phone rang. _Ring ring ring ring riiiiing _

Kyoya was the first to answer it. "Hello?"

"_Hey, Kyo-chan! The girls and I are hanging out tomorrow at the park at 12:30 PM! Do you wanna come?"_ Riko asked cheerfully on the other line.

As mood killing as her cheerfulness was, to Kyoya, it felt great to hear her sweet voice. "Sure. I'd love to come."

"_Is something wrong? You sound sad,"_ Riko asked with concern.

"I'll tell you later. But I'll go. Definitely. See ya," Kyoya told her before hanging up.

* * *

Unfortunately for Kyoya, he didn't sleep well last night. Horrible images of a child being beaten by a woman flashed through his mind. The gravely voice from the tape recording resounded in his brain. Kyoya tried to get it out, but it refused to do so. Finally, in one dream, a woman came up to him, about to smack him. Before she could land a hit, Kyoya woke up with a gasp, his face drowning in sweat. After some heavy breathing, he wiped the sweat off his face.

"God...I should never have heard that tape…" Kyoya muttered.

"Did you just have a nightmare?" Lovebeam asked from her little makeshift bed-a basket with tiny pillows and blankets inside. She had a purple flower printed cloth and a sewing needle in her stubby hands.

Kyoya rubbed one of his eyes. "Oh! You can't sleep either?"

Lovebeam shook her head. "The voice woke me up too."

"I see," Kyoya muttered. He smiled when he saw her sewing. "Is that what you do when you have a nightmare?"

"I haven't started yet, but I like sewing. It calms me down, and I like making clothes. I'm about to start making a nice dress for Moonbeam," Lovebeam replied quietly.

Kyoya crawled out of bed, crawled to his desk, stood up, and turned on the lamp. "You need some light, right?"

"But it's two in the morning. Won't it bother you?"

"Nah. I can just read a book. That usually helps me get back to sleep," Kyoya said as he grabbed a copy of a manga. Beast Battles volume five.

"Okay then," Lovebeam replied before a grim expression appeared on her face. "You don't really think the boy in the tape is your brother, do you?"

"I don't know. It's likely it is, but I'm hoping to God that it isn't," Kyoya told her as he opened his manga.

"If I heard that one of my sisters was being abused, I'd want to fly over there, save them, and smack that horrible person in the face!" Lovebeam chirped as she pushed her needle through the cloth another time. "I know Zenjin deserved it for hurting Sunbeam's feelings!"

"You got that right," Kyoya continued reading his manga. Soon, he fell back asleep. Lovebeam turned off the light and tried to go back to sleep as well.

When the day of the get-together arrived, Kyoya didn't even ask his parents if he could go to the park. He just went all on his own. As sad as he was about the child in the tape recording, he needed something to lift his spirits, to kick the gloom out of his system.

Lovebeam spent the morning continuing to work on Moonbeam's dress, making sure certain parts of it are absolutely right. But she decided to take a break and go to the get-together in the park. The usual gang was there: Riko, Anzu, Hotaru, Marina, and the rest of the fairies. This time, Sorane and Umi were with them. Riko was holding a large, white box in her hands that was too big, even for her to carry.

Instead of the drab clothes they used to wear, Sorane and Umi were now wearing nice, fresh new clothes. Umi was wearing a pale green dress that went a little above her knees, knee high white socks, and brown shoes, along with a white cardigan and a small white cashmere hat. She was clutching the strap of a blue bag with some colorful fish patterns all over it. On the other hand, Sorane was wearing a pale pink sweater, a long pale yellow skirt that almost went down to her ankles, black stockings, brown shoes, and white, wing shapes accessories holding up her large pigtails.

Anzu saw them and waved her arm left and right with a bright smile on her face. "Hey, guys! You made it!" She shouted as Kyoya and Lovebeam wheeled up to them.

"Wouldn't miss it for the world," Kyoya told her.

"Hey! Hey! Kyo-chan! We found new Pretty Cure! These are our new friends Sorane-san and Umi-chan! Hotaru-chan's parents adopted them and they're her new sisters now!" Riko explained excitedly, giving the box to Marina and dragging them over to meet Kyoya.

"Hi there!" Umi chirped sweetly. Sorane waved at him silently.

"New Pretty Cure?" Kyoya gave them a glare. "Prove it."

Umi dug out her Heart Lighter and showed it to him. Sorane did the same. Kyoya smiled. "I believe you. Awesome!"

"What's that you got there?" Sorane asked Riko.

Riko smiled and opened the box. Inside was a square, delicious looking cake with green and white frosting on it. It had the words _'Welcome to the team!'_ written on it in green frosting. "I had Mom custom order it for you! It's to celebrate your official entry into the team!"

Sorane was touched. She placed her hands on her chest, her eyes glimmering with gratitude. "Awww! You're so sweet! Thank you so much!"

"I brought utensils, too!" Riko exclaimed, pulling out a box of plastic forks and knives.

"Ooooh! Cake?! Yummy!" Umi chirped, drooling for that delicious cake.

"Why are you...doing all this for us?" Sorane asked.

"Why shouldn't we? We're Pretty Cure, and it's our duty to welcome our new friends and make them feel at home!" Riko exclaimed.

"She's right," Moonbeam added.

Umi hugged Marina. "You guys are great!"

Kyoya smiled in agreement. "They sure are!"

"Come on! Let's eat some cake already!" Lovebeam exclaimed.

"I get the first piece!" Sunbeam shouted.

"Hey! No fair! Let Umi or Sorane get the first piece!" Moonbeam argued. "It's their cake!"

The kids sat down on the grass and began picking at the cake pieces they wanted to eat. What they didn't know was that Zenjin was watching them from afar, with a grim, jealous look on his face. _'Why are they happy and I'm not? Only I deserve to be happy!'_ He thought with a grunt before turning around.

He was about to walk off until he saw the woman that Kyoya and his family saw in Aida. The woman clutched the strap of her beige purse like she was trying to force herself to do something. She looked conflicted but determined. After a short while, she started walking again. _'I can't keep silent anymore! Now that Mother told me everything she knows, I have to report this!'_ The woman thought.

Zenjin rolled his eyes. "I have some steam I wanna let off, so whatever," Zenjin mused before shooting a purple ball of light at the woman, sending her rolling on the street, exposing her Soul Portal. She didn't even get to scream, the attack was so sudden.

But it was enough to make Moonbeam's ears twitch. "Oh no! Zenjin's back!"

"Awww, really?!" Marina complained. "We can't even eat our cake!"

"Cake can wait! Priorities, people!" Riko boomed.

"Get off me!" The woman yelled hysterically as she tried to force the silver haired boy off of her, but to no avail. Soon, he strapped her to a wall and dunked his head in her Soul Portal. He expected to not find anything in there, like usual.

But he found something.

"What?! No way!" Zenjin yelled as he looked further into her Soul Portal.

"Get out of there right now, Zenjin!" Cure Twilight was the first to pounce behind him and try to yank him off. But he kicked her and sent her rolling on the sidewalk.

"Let me finish! I finally found what I've been looking for all this time!" Zenjin roared.

Despite his response, the girls still tried to pry him off anyway. However, he pulled his head out and with a swipe of his hand, sent the transformed girls flying. Not too far. He turned around to face the now exhausted woman he just assaulted.

"Thanks a whole lot for the info. Now I know what to look for! But otherwise, you're worthless!" Zenjin put his hand in her Soul Portal and yanked out her Soul Orb.

"Drop it NOW! Dawn Sunny Whip!" With a glowing yellow whip in her hands, Cure Dawn threw it at Zenjin, causing him to drop the Soul Orb. It fell on the grass, which prevented it from breaking. But he already managed to corrupt it.

"I am the light that will brighten your world, Cure Twilight!"

"I am the lights that illuminate the darkness, Cure Starlight!"

"I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

"I am the light that will warm your heart, Cure Dusk!"

"I am the light that sparkles on the ocean waves, Cure Sealight!"

"I am the light whose wings radiate the sky, Cure Skylight!"

"We will banish the darkness with the light from our hearts! We are the luminous quintet! Luminous Pretty Cure!"

"Wait a minute!" Cure Dusk exclaimed after their obligatory Pretty Cure introduction pose. "Did you just say you were looking for something and now you've found it?"

"Uh, yeah?" Zenjin replied nonchalantly.

"So...basically you dunk your head in people's Soul Portals because all this time you've been LOOKING for something?!" Moonbeam yelped.

"DUH! What did you think I was gonna do to them?! Eat them?! And in case you're wondering, I am NOT telling you what I just found! I've been dying to get this information and now I have something to go on! If you'll EXCUSE me, I have a mission to fulfill! Smell ya later, freaks!" Zenjin bellowed before teleporting away.

"Boy is he rude," Sealight mused. She had seen rude people before, but they weren't nearly as rude as Zenjin.

"I hate him," Skylight piped in.

"Don't we all," Dawn agreed.

Kyoya's eyes widened when he saw Zenjin's current victim of the week. The woman he talked to from Aida.

Her Soul Orb just turned into a giant black gazelle. It was about the size of an average house for two. Surprisingly, Cure Twilight was brimming with confidence. "Ready to take it down, girls?"

"Ready!"

"Starlight and Dawn! You two keep the giant gazelle from getting into town and destroying everything!" Cure Twilight commanded.

"Yes ma'am!" Starlight and Dawn agreed before storming off to stop the gazelle, which started running toward the park. Dawn was quick to throw her glowing chain of light on the gazelle, wrapping it all around its body. Her grip is so tight on it that the gazelle couldn't break free. Cure Starlight landed some strong punches and kicks on it, on both its head and its legs, keeping it from moving too much. She was careful not to go under it, or else she'd get crushed by its hooves.

"Dusk, Skylight, Sealight and I will weaken it with our attacks, but we have to do so as carefully as possible. We don't want to frighten or hurt any of the people here. Got that?" Cure Twilight exclaimed.

"Yes, ma'am!" Cures Dusk and Skylight exclaimed before springing into action.

"Starlight Shower!"

"Dusk Medley!"

"Twilight Masquerade!"

"Emerald Tsunami!"

"Skyward Sword!" Skylight pulled out her cutlass and slashed off the gazelle's horns, causing it to squeal and writhe in pain. Cure Twilight covered her ears, but she extended her tail toward the gazelle's legs and smacked them with it, hoping it'll do enough damage to make it not be able to walk. Sealight jumped in and landed some swift punches and kicks while it was down to weaken it some more.

"Wow! She's good!" Cure Dawn mused, awestruck by how easily Skylight managed to slice off the gazelle's horns.

"We'll help you out too!" All four fairies fired beams of energy at the gazelle, weakening it further. But it wasn't enough to make it stop struggling.

"I can't hold onto it much longer!" Cure Dawn grimaced, trying her hardest to keep that blasted gazelle in place so it doesn't trample people or wreak havoc.

"I got this! But you might want to cover your ears!" Skylight warned. Everyone covered their ears.

Cure Dawn's chain disappeared, and the gazelle is free. But it was weak, and unable to walk properly due to the wounds on its legs. "Skyward Scream!"

Even with their ears covered, pain shot through the girls' bodies as Skylight's piercing scream echoed all throughout the neighborhood. It even caused actual physical pain on the gazelle, such as leaving white marks on its body. After a couple seconds, Skylight finished.

"Time for the obligatory finishing move!" Cure Dawn exclaimed.

Skylight and Sealight joined them without question. They didn't have Light Bringers, but that didn't matter. "Bless us with your shine, holy light! Pretty Cure Shining Light!" Their light shone brighter than anything. The light was so bright, it stripped the gazelle of its skin, making it disappear into thin air. It left behind the woman's Soul Orb. Kyoya grabbed it and put it back in the woman's Soul Portal. The color returned to her face and she moved a little.

"Yay! We did it!" Moonbeam cheered.

Cure Dawn leaped onto Cures Sealight and Skylight, trapping them both in a tight hug. "It's all thanks to you two!"

"We didn't do much," Cure Skylight stammered bashfully.

"That was actually kinda fun," Cure Sealight piped in.

After that, the girls finished their cake and headed on home.


	36. Zenjin Sings the Carol of the Drum!

**Trigger warnings for**: child abuse, wanton destruction

* * *

Chapter 33: An Unexpected Reunion! Zenjin Sings The Carol of the Drum!

"Finally! _Finally_ I have something to go on!" Zenjin shouted to himself as he hopped from roof top to roof top, looking for everything he saw in that woman's Soul Portal: the white house, the school by the ocean, the town he lived in, even the street he lived on. He had to get there. He needed to get there. He wasted no time hopping on every house he saw, only flying when he felt like it.

There were some things on this quest that made it difficult for him to reach his destination. For one thing, he knows the place but not which direction it was in. Secondly, he couldn't read, so he wouldn't be able to know if he was in the area or not. But he couldn't care less. He had to get there. He felt like his life depended on it. However, snow began to fall. His stomach growled, begging for food to consume, and he could feel himself shivering a little. The bitter cold stung his entire body, not just his visible skin, and his teeth chattered.

Descending to the ground, he saw a local food store nearby. A Giant Falcon to be exact. Clutching his roaring stomach, he went inside. This store is different from the other one, so he doesn't have to worry about the same people from before harassing him about paying for everything he stole. Zenjin doesn't have a penny to his name, only powers. He could create money, but he chose not to. He did, however, create a bag so he can throw stuff in it. He pulled off apples, bananas, pocky boxes, cartons of chocolate milk, soda cans, cartons of apple juice, boxes of fruit gummies, cookies, a big loaf of Italian bread, peanut butter, Nutella, and other things.

"What do you think you're doing?!" One store employee yelped upon seeing his ridiculously large bag of stolen food. Zenjin gave him a raspberry, snapped his fingers, and teleported away with the bag in tow, leaving the employee speechless, his jaw hanging open quite ungracefully.

Zenjin teleported to his fortress, put the food away, and returned to the area where he was before, only he ripped of a piece of the Italian bread and carried it around so he could eat it as he flew. But soon, he found himself too tired to fly anymore, so he settled on walking. The tiny snowflakes floated down onto the world with their ephemeral presence, seeming content with just falling and fluttering, meshing with the ground and anything else they landed on. To a person who appreciated the beauty of nature, the snowflakes are beautiful. But Zenjin was not one to appreciate the beauty of nature.

He found himself disgusted by the huge troves of houses that donned Christmas lights. The bright colors, the cute snowmen ornaments, Santa Claus, what was so good about them? To Zenjin, nothing. He always hated Christmas. Everyone always got overly preachy, cheesy, and sentimental about love and happiness and generosity this time of year. Zenjin saw a big blow up snow man in front of someone else's house. Finding its big, cute, goofy smile and appearance to be too nauseous to look at, he fired a beam of light at it and promptly blew it up, reducing it to nothing but charred scraps.

Christmas music played in the air. Something joyful and lively, but Zenjin wished no music would play at all. He stopped when he found himself in front of a shop advertising a new dress. A beautiful salmon pink dress with a lacy bodice was on display, and Zenjin was right in front of the big window showing it off. Girls would love to fawn over it and lament over the fact that they won't have enough money to buy it. But Zenjin didn't see a dress. He saw himself being forced into one, shoved outside in the bitter cold, being laughed at by any children who came near him in that humiliating state. With rage taking over his being, he fired yet another beam of light at the dress shop, blowing it right up, reducing it to flames and rubble before flying off. He could hear the lovely sound of people screaming and crying.

Soon, he found himself walking toward a house with a small dog house in front of it. Nothing was in there, much to Zenjin's displeasure, and it looked wooden and brand new. But he didn't see a dog house. He saw himself being forced into one in the bitter cold, wearing short sleeved clothes, starving and begging for the woman to let him inside so he could be warm. Again, Zenjin blew up that dog house, reducing it to flames and rubble.

"Pheh! I wish a dog was in there so I could blow one up along with it!" Zenjin mused as he chewed on his Italian bread.

The cold didn't lessen one bit, even as the sky turned darker than the midnight blue, and his entire body screamed for protection against it. His clothes, while stylish to him, were thin in material, and not fit to fight against the cold. But Zenjin didn't care. He was used to it by now. It can wait. He finished the loaf he ripped off, but he wanted more. Before he knew it, he found himself walking in front of a small church with their doors open.

That was when he heard it.

He stopped as voices sang a lovely Christmas song.

"_Come they told me, pa rum pa pum pum,_

_A newborn King to see, pa rum pa pum pum,_

_Our finest gifts we bring, pa rum pa pum pum."_

The melody was familiar. Everything about it was. Something about it rang a bell. Zenjin whistled along with the fourth stanza.

"_To lay before the King, pa rum pa pum pum, rum pa pum pum, rum pa pum pum."_

They matched perfectly.

The song that had been with him all his life...was this one.

He couldn't let this opportunity slip. Silently, he slipped into the church and sat on a pew in the very back, so nobody could see him. There were many people in the audience, and all of the seats were occupied except for Zenjin's. He had the pew all to himself. He listened intently to the song, focusing on nothing else. Soon, he found himself nodding off, before finally falling right asleep.

Lost in dreamland, images came into his mind as the church people continued to sing the song. Himself as a very young toddler, about one or two years old. A happy young man fawning over him. A wind chime swaying in the breeze, its chime echoing softly. The song playing on some old record player. A yellow house in the woods getting farther and farther away from him. Himself smiling happily, in the arms of the man with short hair and the very small goatee.

The song faded, but Zenjin was still lost in sleep until he felt something shake his shoulder. "Hello? Hello? Wake up, young man," The deep, rich voice of a man said, waking him from his slumber.

Shocked by the sudden touch, Zenjin smacked the man's hand away and adopted a defensive stance. The priest in his dark robe gasped a little, taking a few steps back in surprise. "I'm sorry to disturb you, but mass is over."

Zenjin glared at him before storming out of the church. However, as he flew onto the church's roof, he couldn't help but feel odd. Where did those memories come from all of a sudden? Zenjin never remembered those before. But they felt real. Real, kind, and warm. Not like his life with the woman.

Then he had an idea. He kneeled down on one knee, folded his hands together, and prayed. _'Energia. Please, take me to the yellow house in my memories,'_ He waited and waited. Nothing happened. "Guh. Guess just picturing it won't get me anywhere. I wonder if I need to be more specific?" Zenjin mused before closing his eyes again. "Okay then. Take me to 213 Ai Avenue, Aida, Chiba Prefecture."

All of a sudden, he teleported. When he opened his eyes, he found himself in front of the condemned white house. Already memories began to flood his mind, but he shook them off. Since it was dark out, he snuck into the house through the back door. He noticed that the old, splintery dog house was now completely dirty and decrepit, with big holes on the roof. He went inside, and noticed that most of the furniture in the house was gone, except for a decrepit couch and a bureau with some drawers missing. But he walked up the stairs and found himself in a small, empty bedroom.

Empty except for one single bed and pillow. It was dotted with old urine stains, there was a spring coiling out from one side, and it had some rips on various parts of it. But other than that, it had a blanket on it. The pillow had no pillow sheet covering it, but for the most part it was in tact. Zenjin walked over to the bed and pressed on it with both of his hands. It was hard and creaky.

On impulse, he took off his boots and crawled into the bed, covering himself with the blanket and putting the pillow underneath his head. Without realizing it, he fell right asleep. The images from his nap in the church returned, blocking out the terrible memories of the evil woman.

Light forced him to wake, but it was relatively dim when he woke up. Sunbeams permeated the glass window above him, but they didn't do much to light up the room since it was right next to a big tree, even as it was completely leafless. But he felt rejuvenated and alert. He sat up, yawned, and stretched out his limbs.

"Wow. I actually got a good night's sleep. I never got one in this dump. Maybe this means I've gotten stronger," Zenjin said as he got up from the bed and walked through the halls.

Other than it being completely empty and decrepit, the house was the same as Zenjin remembered it. He went down into the unfinished basement. The walls were gray, with huge brown spots all over them. The washing machine and the dryer were still in place, but they looked as though they hadn't been used in years. The pipes were rusty, the urine stained cot was still where it originally was, and the little bathroom was still there. He walked into the little bathroom. The inside of the toilet was dirty and dry, the shower head was rusty, the sink was covered with dust, and the morning sun permeated the tiny window, completely brightening it up.

But Zenjin did notice something else. One of the bricks in the bathroom protruded a little bit, and a very small edge of paper peeked out from it. Zenjin kneeled down and pulled the brick out. When he put it down, he looked into the hole and found himself stumped.

There were envelopes with letters in them, along with an old diary with a maroon, leather cover. Zenjin undid the lock on the diary and opened it. He couldn't read it for the life of him, but he noticed a picture of a house was lodged in between two pages.

A yellow house in the woods. The same one in his memories. This confirmed that the house is indeed real. He noticed that there's some writing on the pages. Only a few scribbles, not enough writing to cover whole pages, like all the other pages. But he was able to read one thing.

"Shi-o-do-me A-sa-o," Zenjin mumbled, stumbling on the words a bit. Then he noticed another picture. A picture of a young looking man with flat black hair, soft brown eyes, and a very small goatee on his chin. Zenjin gasped. The man from his memories was real, too! Zenjin grabbed the letters and the diary and stormed out of the house. Through the back door. He didn't want to get caught breaking in there.

He flew as far away from it as he could, taking care not to drop the letters, the pictures, and the diary. He descended on a pier, overlooking the ocean. Then he saw a large building about thirty feet away from it. He flew toward it, and immediately he recognized it. The sign read Aida Elementary School. He went inside. The building was abandoned, but the doors weren't locked. He walked through the halls. Some of them were covered with old cut-outs of flowers, suns, moons, and other shapes made from construction paper. Some of the paint was peeling off the walls. Other parts of the walls were completely bare.

He then walked into one classroom. The lights were off, so the open windows lit it up, but it still remained dim. There were many desks, some of them were turned around or broken, missing legs or pieces of wood. Many of them had crayon scribbles on them. Zenjin saw one desk right in the center of the classroom. He saw himself in it. A younger version of himself, just staring off into space while the teacher went about her lessons and everyone else answered questions. With a grimace, he left the classroom and went outside.

The fenced in blacktop was overrun with grass. The chain link fence was there, keeping everything in, even though there wasn't anything to keep in. Zenjin remembered the many children playing their games, laughing and running about while he just sat in a corner, watching everybody with a listless look in his eyes. With that, he flew out of the school and back on the street.

He saw a man passing by. Zenjin looked down at the diary. A thought entered his head, but it made him disgusted. But then again, he had no other options. He had to try.

"Excuse me! Sir!" Zenjin called out, running toward the confused man.

"Hello there. Can I help you?" The young man asked.

"Would you read this part here out loud?" Zenjin opened the diary and pointed to the page in which the picture of the yellow house was kept in.

"Can't you do it yourself?"

Zenjin blushed, his face a mask of shame. "I...can't read."

"Oh. I see. Alright then," The man said before reading the passage. _"This is where he lives. 1993 Yotsuba Drive, in the Hikawa Woods. I'll make that man suffer for betraying me."_

Zenjin smiled a bit. "Thank you!" He took the diary and ran away.

Once he was out of sight, he flew into a tree and prayed. _'Energia. Take me to 1993 Yotsuba Drive, Hikawa Woods.'_

He teleported, but he wasn't sure if it worked. When he opened his eyes, he didn't find himself in Aida anymore. Instead, he found himself deep in a forest. "Guess it only works if you're specific enough. Well, I made it," Zenjin mused to himself before walking. Finally, he happened upon the yellow house from his memories. It was exactly the same as the picture, except there was a big wind chime dangling from the front of the house, and there were some flower pots full of pansies.

Zenjin stopped about ten feet from the door. He couldn't believe his eyes. The yellow house from his memories was real. The fact that he supposedly had a life before the evil woman was real. Zenjin wasn't sure what to do. Should he knock on the door? What if no one answers, and if someone does, what should he say? How would he be received? Zenjin stamped his foot.

'_Why am I even worrying about this stuff?!'_ Zenjin thought, aggravated.

Before he could turn around and bolt, the door opened. Out came a small, rugged man with flat, black hair, soft brown eyes, and a small beard, wearing a brown sweater underneath an olive green sweater vest, dark blue jeans, and beige combat boots. The man stopped when he saw Zenjin on his front yard. "Hello there. Can I help you?"

Zenjin clutched his arm tightly to get himself to talk. "Are you...are you...Shiodome...Asao?"

"Yes. I am," Asao said as he walked toward the silver haired boy. "How do you know me?"

"I…" Zenjin found himself stumbling over his words. He decided it'd be best to just give him the letters and the diary. Asao took the items and looked through them, finding himself quite shocked.

"How...how did you get these things?" Asao asked until it dawned on him. "Wait...are you…?"

Zenjin said nothing.

"Oh my word...is it...really you? Are you the boy?"

Zenjin nodded.

Asao fell to his knees. "I...I...I...I can't believe it…" Asao stammered. "I...I never thought I'd see you again…" He stood back up. "Come on inside. You must be hungry."

Zenjin quietly followed Asao inside. His house was rather quaint on the inside, with beige walls covered with paintings by famous artists, such as Monet and Picasso. There was an old record player in the living room. Asao and Zenjin sat at the dining room table, trying to take in the situation at hand. Asao simply looked through the letters and the diary. Zenjin ate some chicken noodle soup that Asao prepared.

"These are the letters she and I exchanged," Asao said, looking through the letters.

"In case you're wondering, don't call me by that name. I go by Zenjin now," Zenjin told him quietly.

"I see," Asao looked a little sad when Zenjin said that.

"You raised me, didn't you? For a while?"

Asao nodded. "You want to know everything?"

Zenjin nodded.

"You see, at the time, I was homeless and down on my luck," Asao began. "She found me and wanted me to do something for her. She was going to pay me a huge sum of money. I was stupid and went right along with her plan...until I found out what she was planning to do to you. A page of her diary was open and I happened to read it. I knew your life was in danger, so I took you from the hospital. But I didn't give you to her. I took you here."

Zenjin listened silently, finishing his soup and moving on to a peanut butter sandwich. "So...she hired you to kidnap me?"

"Yes," Asao confessed ruefully. "But I wasn't going to let her have her way with you. I wanted to keep you safe from her. This house was abandoned when I found it, but it was still inhabitable, so I thought you and I could start our life here," Asao said. "I know I should have called the police and given them to you, but I was afraid. Afraid that she might have been looking for me. Two years later, I thought about telling the police so they could return you to your real family. But she must have found me, and took you away before I could do anything," Some tears creeped out of Asao's eyes right then and there. "I...I've searched for you for years. There was never a day when I didn't worry about your safety or go out looking for you. I wanted to do more, but I had to remain in hiding because of my crime."

Zenjin couldn't believe it. Someone actually cared about him? And not for ulterior motive? Well, it was at first, but he tried to protect him even though he failed. "Uh, Zenjin. Tell me. How...how did you find me?"

All Zenjin did was whistle the first four stanzas of that song.

That was all it took. "Oh! That's Little Drummer Boy!"

"What?" Zenjin asked, confused. "Is that the song's name?"

"Yes!" Asao exclaimed with a smile, clasping his hands together. "Oh, when you were little you'd make me play it over and over on Christmas time. It was your favorite, and I sang you to sleep with it. Now I wonder if I still have the album?" Asao explained as he looked around the living room. Zenjin followed him inside, but he sat on the couch. "Oh! Here it is!" Asao pulled out an old white and blue record album with a drawing of a little boy with a drum on it. "Do you want to listen to it?"

Zenjin nodded. Asao pulled the record out and put it on the record player. _Vroom. Vroom. Vroom._

"_Come, they told me,_

_A newborn king to see,_

_Our finest gifts we bring,_

_To lay before the king,_

_So to honor him,_

_When we come._

_Baby Jesus,_

_I am a poor boy too,_

_I have no gift to bring,_

_That's fit to give a king."_

Neither Asao nor Zenjin said anything as the lofty song resounded throughout the house. Memories flooded Zenjin's mind. Flashing Christmas lights, tiny snowflakes falling gently down on the ground, Asao's warm smile, a little one year old Zenjin walking on his stubby legs trying to grasp some ornaments on their Christmas tree, the record player playing this same song.

"_Shall I play for you,_

_On my drum?  
Mary nodded,_

_The ox and lamb kept time,_

_I played my drum for him,_

_I played my best for him."_

Asao smiled at this point. "Welcome back," He said in a soft voice.

"_Then he smiled at me,_

_Me and my drums."_

With a final chime of a triangle, the song ended, and Asao took the record out of the record player. "It's too happy. I hate happy," Zenjin mused out loud.

Asao's smile faded as he put the record away. "You used to love it when you were a baby. You'd make me play it over and over again."

"Did I really?" Zenjin had an icy look in his eyes, like the song made him sick. "Got any more grub?"

Without question, Asao gave Zenjin some more food, or a plate of spaghetti with meatballs and a glass of cold milk to be more precise. Zenjin scarfed it all down within seconds, and Asao couldn't prevent the dropping of his jaw. "You should eat slower or you'll choke, and you shouldn't put your elbows on the table. It's bad manners."

"Tooh wet naoh," Zenjin retorted with a huge wad of spaghetti dangling from his mouth. When he finished, he drank the entire glass of milk in one whole sip. A thought popped in Asao's head regarding why Zenjin eats the way he does, and he was scared to bring it up.

But he brought it up anyway. "Did...she ever give you food?"

"Only when I needed it. But most of the time, she wouldn't give me any. For days. The longest I've gone without food is two weeks," Zenjin remembered the icy looks she would give him, her sadistic smiles. He couldn't help but wonder if she enjoyed making his life miserable. "I feel like if I eat everything in one go, I won't give anyone time to take it away from me."

"That won't happen anymore, Zenjin," Asao tried to put his hand on Zenjin's, but the silver haired boy pulled his hand back in alarm. The boy's eyes turned wide with fear, like he thought Asao was going to hit him like the woman would. This already set off alarms in Asao's head. "Zenjin...tell me. What did she do to you?"

Zenjin said nothing at first, but he gingerly pulled off one of his black gloves, leaving his hand bare. He showed his palm to Asao, who gasped when he saw the dried up burns. They went right across his palm, from the left corner all the way to the bottom of Zenjin's index finger. A hand flew to Asao's mouth upon seeing the burn. It didn't look like it healed very well. Zenjin's face was red like a tomato, looking as though he didn't want him to see it and is forcing himself to show him.

"I've never shown these to anyone," Zenjin told him shyly.

"Oh my word…" Asao took Zenjin's hand in his and stroke his palm with his thumb. It felt about the same as the rest of Zenjin's skin, but the scar itself is lighter than his whole hand. "She did this to you?"

"She...caught me walking on the grass. She put my hands over...a lit flame...on the gas stove," Zenjin muttered sheepishly.

The horrible memory flashed back through his mind: the woman exploding with rage, her fat face contorting in an inhuman way, dragging a helpless five year old Zenjin to the top of the stove, grabbing both of his wrists and holding them right on top of blazing blue flames. Little Zenjin cried and cried for her to free him, but she didn't relent and kept yelling something like, _"YOU DESERVE TO BE BRANDED AS A CHILD OF SIN! THIS IS YOUR PUNISHMENT FOR EXISTING!"_ Zenjin cringed when the memory finished.

"What else did she do? I want to know," Asao asked worriedly.

Zenjin wasted no time telling him all the horrible tales of the abuse he endured at the hands of the evil woman. There were too many evil deeds to count, but Asao listened intently and silently. He found himself horrified with everything the woman did to the boy. It was about 5:00 PM when Zenjin finally stopped, and Asao found his face drowning in tears. He cried and buried his face in his hands, leaving Zenjin quite confused.

"Why are you…?"

"I'm so sorry! I'm so so so sorry! I should have given you back to your real family right away! Better yet, I should have called the police and told them about her! I should have saved you! I'm a failure as an adoptive parent!" Asao cried in his rugged hands, undoing the lid on all of the feelings he kept locked away for thirteen years. His suspicions had been confirmed.

"She's persistent to the extreme, so she would have tried to get me whether you told anyone or not. Or she might have found some other kid to use as her outlet for her hate," Zenjin said nonchalantly. "She even put a microchip in me just so she could track me down whenever I tried to run away. Y'know, the ones they put in pets."

Zenjin found himself annoyed by Asao's crying, but he decided to leave him be. In the depths of his chest cavity, he found himself happy that someone cared about him like this, even though he wasn't able to save him when he needed him. It wasn't his fault. The woman was crazy when it came to getting what she wants, and would do just about anything to get what she wanted no matter what.

After a while, Asao stopped crying. "If I had known sooner...that she was going to do this to you...and hire me to give you to her...I would have rejected her right away. I shouldn't have been so stupid. I should have called the police…" He flashed a sad smile. "But...now, I'm happy to see...that you're alive…"

Zenjin didn't know how to feel about that.

"If you want, I can take you to the police station right now, so they can track down your real family-"

"I have no real family!" Zenjin roared all of a sudden, throwing the plate against the wall. _CRASH!_ The plate shattered into pieces, scattering all over the rug. "If I did, they don't care about me! They let me get stolen! They let her do all that bad stuff to me! They probably didn't even look for me all this time!"

Asao stood up in alarm, frightened by his outburst. But he kept his cool. "Zenjin. I'm sure that's not true. Your kidnapping was reported on the news. Lots of people searched for you, and I'm sure your real family, whoever they are, spent years and years looking for you and worrying about you. If my child was stolen, I'd search for them and worry about them like crazy like I did for you all these years!"

This made Zenjin stop yelling. He slumped back into his chair with a grim look on his face. "No one truly cares about me. Everyone who I thought loved me abandoned me when I needed them. My adoptive mother wants nothing to do with me anymore," Zenjin muttered in an icy but sad, trembling voice. "Then again, maybe that woman is right. Maybe all I'm good for is being used for someone's convenience and then discarded when I'm not useful anymore."

"Don't think that way, Zenjin!" Asao exclaimed, kneeling before the silver haired boy with determined, hopeful eyes. "I'm sure there are people out there who love you and care about you. I know I did, and I still do!"

Strangely for Zenjin, Malgorzata and Sunbeam appeared in his mind. They showered him with love, but he thought it was fake, assuming they were trying to trick him and betray him like Decebal and Beileag did. In a way, he betrayed them. The memories of his time with Asao confirmed his feelings for him, so Zenjin was at least happy about that.

"Thank you for taking care of me today," Zenjin said, putting his glove back on and getting out of the chair. "I have to go now."

He was about to go out the door until Asao stopped him. "Wait!"

Zenjin turned around.

"I...I know it's wrong of me to say this, but...in the event that your real family rejects you...you're more than welcome to live with me," Asao blurted out. Zenjin's eyes went wide, which made Asao immediately regret opening his mouth.

'_Urrgh! Asao, you idiot! You shouldn't be so selfish! His real family's been suffering for years and it's your fault! Of course they wouldn't reject him! Don't be so stupid!'_ Asao thought, hitting himself for thinking such inconsiderate thoughts.

"I'd love to. But I can't. I can't live with anyone. I've done...horrible things," Zenjin told him. "You won't like me anymore if I tell you everything I did."

"I don't care what you've done. You'll always be…a son to me," Asao mused with a sad smile.

Zenjin cracked a smile too. "I appreciate it. But...there's something I really really need to do," Zenjin balled his fists. "I feel like I'll die if I don't get it done. It's...like my only reason for living," He confessed sadly.

Asao smiled again. "I see. Do what you have to do. I'll wait for you. There's so much I want to do with you. I'd appreciate it if you'd come and visit so we can spend time together."

"I'll see what I can do. Goodbye," With a small wave, Zenjin walked out the door and flew deep into the forest.

He found himself back in Hikaribashi, right as the moon rose into the dark sky. A tear streamed down his face as he leaned against a tree.

"Then he smiled at me, pa rum pa pum pum…" Zenjin sang in a low, soft voice as tears streamed out of his red eyes. He closed them to stop the waterworks, but it didn't work. A sad smile formed on his face. "...Welcome back…" He made that line up.

* * *

On Christmas Eve, the Luminous Pretty Cure found themselves on Hikaribashi Middle School's soccer field, fighting off a Corrupt Sentinel shaped like a deer with fully grown antlers. The school is closed, and there's nobody on the premises other than them, so they were free to go crazy with their powers. But the girls still tried to be careful regardless, as they don't want to cause any damage and make anyone suspicious.

Cure Twilight wrapped her tail around the deer's legs, hoisted it in the air and threw it on the ground. Cure Dawn dropped in to land some punches on it before it got up. She made sure to maintain some distance and stay away from those sharp antlers. Cure Dusk fired some flaming musical notes at it. Cure Skylight slashed off part of the deer's antlers with her cutlass, causing it to roar in pain. Even Kyoya got in on the action by using a slingshot to fling some rocks at it, one of which got in its left eye.

"Emerald Tsunami!" With a wave of Cure Sealight's arms, a glowing green torrent of water suddenly encased the deer, throwing it against the chain link fence. It let out a squeal as the metal dug into its skin, and the water was so strong it couldn't swim out of the way.

Cure Twilight covered her ears. "Ugh! These things are so loud!"

"Starlight Shower!" Cure Starlight commanded a rain of stars to fall on the helpless buck.

"Ready for the obligatory finishing move?" Cure Dawn asked.

"Heck yeah!" Cure Dusk exclaimed as everyone joined hands-Cures Skylight and Sealight included.

"Bless us with your shine, holy light! Pretty Cure Shining Light!" With their blinding light, they purified the Corrupt Sentinel, reducing it to a glass orb. Cure Skylight took it and put it in the Soul Portal belonging to a fourteen year old girl dressed in a jogging outfit. With that, the girls flew out of the field and into the little forest nearby.

"Whew! That was a good workout!" Cure Dusk exclaimed, turning back to normal and stretching her stiff arms out.

"You said it. I'm getting better at this," Sorane said. She stayed as Cure Skylight.

"Are we?" Umi asked.

Hotaru-still Cure Starlight-put a hand on her shoulder. "You sure are, Sorane-chan. You too, Umi-chan."

Sorane blushed a bit at her praise.

Umi flashed a peace sign. "Thanks!"

"But they're still getting stronger. We shouldn't underestimate them," Riko added worriedly.

"She's right. We still need to be careful," Kyoya added.

"We're getting stronger too, especially now that we have Sorane-senpai in our league of super heroes," Marina piped in happily.

"Come on. My powers aren't anything noteworthy," Sorane told her modestly.

"Are you kidding?! You can wipe out one CS by turning into a white phoenix thing! If that isn't awesome, I don't know what is! But I still can't believe they had to attack on Christmas Eve of all days!" Marina added.

Anzu smiled. _'Mari-chan's become a lot nicer compared to last year. She's really come a long way,'_ Anzu thought to herself as she got out her harmonica and played a little tune to calm everyone down.

"Oh! Riko-chan, I have a little something for you," Hotaru said as she pulled out a small package and handed it to a flummoxed Riko. It's a white box wrapped in a purple ribbon. "Open it."

Quietly, Riko opened the box. "Wooow!" She pulled the contents of the box out, and was delighted to find a small, yellow, cat eared Doraemon(1) plushie. "Aww! Doraemon! Thanks, Hotaru-chan!" Riko squealed with delight as she hugged Hotaru.

"Your brother told me you love cats, and Doraemon is technically a cat, so I couldn't help it," Hotaru said.

"Eh. Doraemon's okay, but it's not for me," Kyoya said.

Umi clasped her hands together. "I love Doraemon! He's so cute!"

"Hey! Here's an idea! How about we hold a Christmas party in the park tomorrow?" Anzu suggested after she stopped playing her harmonica.

"I like the idea, but I don't think our parents want us hanging out with friends on Christmas. It's supposed to be a family thing," Kyoya told her.

"I wanna go!" Umi exclaimed cheerfully.

"It'll be fine! My dad usually lets me do what I want," Anzu said.

"I'll ask my parents about it," Hotaru said.

"Me too. They'll probably say no," Kyoya added.

"Me three. But we'd love to have a Christmas party!" Riko said.

"We'll let you know when we have any answers. Okay?" Sorane told her.

"Okay. That's fine," Anzu said.

After that, the girls went home for the day. They couldn't wait for Christmas tomorrow. Sorane, Hotaru, and Umi were especially overjoyed to find some delicious sukiyaki on the table for them. Umi loves sukiyaki, and wasted no time chowing down. Christmas was sure to be lovely.


	37. No Need For Promises!

_**ATTENTION: TRIGGER WARNING FOR DOMESTIC ABUSE AND VICTIM BLAMING!**_

* * *

Chapter 34: No Need for Promises! A Christmas Full of Surprises and Hope!

A light snow fell in Hikaribashi on Christmas morning, and if one looked at the town from the sky, all the lit up houses down below really made it look like a bridge of light, like its namesake. Christmas is a merry holiday, meant to celebrate the goodness of happiness, giving, and living. But for some, it's just another day. For others, it's just another miserable day.

Not for the Luminous Pretty Cure! After they opened their presents at home and had breakfast with their families, they got permission to go to the park and have a little Christmas party. The snow stopped falling by this time. Sunbeam brought lots of homemade cookies and a Christmas cake she made all by herself. Her sisters had to carry it since it's so big and heavy, but they managed to keep it safe. Everyone donned their winter clothes and brought presents with them. Kyoya came in his manual wheelchair since his electric wheelchair and snow don't mix.

"Here, An-chan! I got this for you!" Riko handed Anzu a box, and she opened it to find a black shirt with fake blood splatter on it.

"Awesome! Thanks, Riko-chan! Here's something I got for you!" Anzu handed Riko a small box, and she opened it to find a little Doraemon necklace.

"Aww! Thank you!" Riko trapped Anzu in a hug.

"I know this isn't much, but here," Hotaru handed Sorane a bag. Sorane opened it to find a blue jay plushie and a book called The Everything Bird Book.

"Wow. Thanks…" Sorane muttered shyly. Hotaru smiled.

"Hey, Mari-chan!" Umi happily hopped in front of Marina and handed her a small bag. "I got this for you!"

Curious, Marina dug through the bag and pulled out its contents. She almost screamed upon seeing what was inside. It was a figurine of Blue Moon's members-Kinou Asa and Nakaya Yoko.

"Oh my God! I've been looking for this for years! Where'd you find it?!" Marina yelped. For a moment she thought her eyes were playing tricks on her.

Umi smiled. She expected this kind of reaction. "It was on sale at a shop nearby. I know you like Blue Moon, so I couldn't help it."

Teary eyed, Marina leaped onto Umi and trapped her in a tight, warm hug. "Thanks soooo much, Umi-chan! You're the best!"

"You're welcome!" Umi chirped. Sorane couldn't help but chuckle.

"Everyone! I made some nice clothes for you!" Lovebeam exclaimed as she pulled out some very nice, detailed, fashionable shirts for everyone in their respective Pretty Cure colors. "I've been working on these all month, and I made them all for each of you!" Lovebeam handed Hotaru a blue shirt.

"That's so sweet of you, Lovebeam!" Sorane crooned as Lovebeam handed Kyoya a tan shirt she made for him.

"I got this for you, Kyoya. If you don't like it, that's fine," Marina handed Kyoya a small box, and he opened it to find a small dog shaped key chain.

"Thanks, Mari! I'll put this on my house key!" Kyoya immediately pulled out his house key and put the dog key chain on it. Marina smiled, happy that he liked her gift.

After a while, the kids and fairies finished exchanging presents and decided to eat the Christmas cake and cookies that Sunbeam made. They're quite good. "Man, I gotta tell ya Sunbeam, your cooking's come a long way since you first came to Earth," Marina said with a mouth full of cake.

"It's not polite to talk with your mouth full," Moonbeam said.

"Oh, it's fine!" Anzu said. "It's not like we're in the Prime Minister's office or some fancy schmancy party or anything."

"Good point," Sunbeam said bashfully. "And thanks!"

Starbeam just sat on a cold bench nearby, eating her slice of cake, staring off into space. "Is something wrong, Starbeam? You look kinda down," Kyoya asked.

"Has anyone noticed that we haven't seen Beileag since after battle we had with Zenjin on Rozaniela?" Starbeam asked in a low voice.

Anzu crossed her hands and ruminated. "Come to think of it, we haven't seen her around since that time at the library. I wonder what she's doing now?"

"Who's Beileag?" Sorane asked.

"Oh! We didn't tell you, did we?" Hotaru said. "Beileag was Zenjin's adoptive mother. She helps Zenjin steal people's souls and turn them into Corrupt Sentinels."

"Ohhh. I get it," Sorane said.

"Also...I wish we could spend this Christmas with mother and father…" Starbeam said wistfully. All the fairies donned wistful looks on their faces.

But Sunbeam cheered up quite quickly. "Don't be so down! This is Christmas, and we should be happy! Mom and Dad are alive, so that's good! Besides, I don't think they'd want us to be all sad and weepy all the time, so we better make the best of it!" Sunbeam exclaimed cheerfully.

"She has a good point," Moonbeam said.

"You're most certainly right, Sunbeam," Starbeam agreed.

"Oh...you're separated from your parents?" Sorane asked, surprised by this new piece of information.

"Yeah. They're alive, but they haven't been able to contact Sunbeam and her sisters much. They say they're busy with their jobs and helping Rozaniela get back on its feet," Riko explained in a casual, matter-of-fact way.

Umi clutched Sorane's arm. "I see."

Sorane flashed a sad smile. "They're lucky. Mine are...dead," Sorane muttered sadly.

"Oh. I didn't know," Riko said, her heart going out to the older girl. "Sorry."

"It's fine. Hotaru's family adopted me, so I'm feeling much better," Sorane said with a nicer smile this time.

Starbeam tried on the frilly dress that Lovebeam made for her, and the latter was just smitten. "My! It looks so great on you, Starbeam!"

Starbeam blushed while stroking her ear. "I am truly grateful for your generosity," Starbeam said.

Anzu tapped Umi on the shoulder and handed her a pink goldfish plush. "This is for you."

Umi's eyes lit up like the sun. "Wow! It's Gyopi-chan! Thanks, An-chan!" Umi trapped Anzu in a tight hug, almost to the point of suffocating her. Anzu didn't mind, though. She was happy Umi liked her gift. It was a given, since Umi loves anything related to fish...except seafood, of course!

The kids hung out for quite a while. But they had to leave a little while later because they had to spend time with their families, so they exchanged their presents, said goodbye, and left the park. However, while Christmas may be a happy time for some, for others it's quite miserable.

That couldn't be more true for Inoue Yoshie. She just sat on a cold bench, tucked away in her big, thick, beige winter jacket. She was also wearing black jeans, beige uggs, fluffy white ear muffs, and dark purple gloves. She stared off into space with tears in her eyes. The bitter cold stung her exposed cheeks, but she didn't care. She wanted it to be cold. She wished she could be completely numb. She found herself lost in memories she wished were nothing but illusions.

(flashback)

_This took place in October. Yoshie arrived at school like usual, and found Toshiko sitting at her usual seat. "Hey, Toshi-chan! I brought some Halloween candy for you!" Yoshie pulled out some candies-Butterfingers, Kit Kat bars, Milky Ways-and tried to hand them to Toshiko, but she didn't take them._

_This made Yoshie quite confused. "What's wrong? You said you liked this stuff."_

_Again, no response._

_Yoshie's face contorted to match her irritation. "I go out of my way to get you your favorite Halloween candy, and you have the nerve to-" She was about to call Toshiko out on being so ungrateful and inconsiderate, but she got cut off._

"_Yoshie. It's not like that. Listen...my parents don't want me hanging out with you anymore," Toshiko finally told her reluctantly._

"_Why?" Yoshie asked._

"_They read my emails. They keep saying you're a bad influence and that you're poisoning my mind. They don't want me around you anymore. If they find out I'm talking to you, they'll ground me," Toshiko told her._

"_That's stupid! We've been friends since 5th grade! They can't control you! Screw them, and they shouldn't go looking in your emails! It's an invasion of privacy!" Yoshie exclaimed. Toshiko rolled her eyes._

"_That, I agree with. But…" Toshiko agreed._

"_But what?" Yoshie didn't like the direction this conversation was going into._

"_Honestly...I think it's about time we moved on. See other people, y'know?" Toshiko said in a matter-of-fact way. She didn't mean any harm by it. But to Yoshie, Toshiko was basically saying their friendship was now over._

_Yoshie found herself in a bad mood for the entire day. Finally, when she saw Toshiko leave, she yelled, "Fine! Ignore me for all I care! I only used you to make me look good anyway, you ungrateful tramp! I hope you get diabetes from eating all that candy!"_

(end flashback one, begin flashback two)

_This took place in late November. Yoshie couldn't believe that her girl posse was now crumbling. Toshiko's practically cut her off and is moving on with her life. Not only that, Toshiko looked happy with her new life away from Yoshie. She joined the chess club and from what Yoshie could see, she was very good at chess. Yoshie remembered the times they would play checkers together at their sleepovers and Toshiko would always win. _

'Oh well. At least I have Shizuka. I know she'll be my BFF forever. She's nothing without me,'_ Yoshie thought...at first._

_Yoshie noticed that now Shizuka began to drift away from her, focusing more and more on hanging out with Fukiko and talking about fashion with her despite their problems regarding Hiroto. It continued on for quite a while, and Yoshie found herself wishing death on Fukiko just for taking Shizuka away from her. She wondered if Fukiko was secretly turning her friend against her._

_That turned out to be wrong when Yoshie confronted Shizuka one day._

"_Hey! Shizu-chan! I want you to come hang out with me tonight!" Yoshie exclaimed at recess one day._

"_No! Get away from me!" Shizuka yelled back._

"_What's with you?! Why don't you hang out with me anymore?!" Yoshie yelled, confused by this change that took over her friend._

"_Because you're a jerk, that's why! You know what?! I can't take it anymore!" Shizuka roared. "I'm tired of you dragging me around and treating me like your slave! I do all the work for you and you don't even lift a finger! You don't even say thank you when I do anything, and you always blame ME for stuff that YOU do! I'm done with you, you self-absorbed priss!" Shizuka tried to leave, but Yoshie grabbed her arm._

"_You're NOTHING without me!" Yoshie roared. Undeterred, Shizuka pulled her arm off with an icy look in her eyes._

"_No, Yoshie. You're the one who's nothing. Things are finally looking up for me, and I'm not going to let you run my life anymore. Have you tried being nice? It's not that hard. You can't live your life being a jerk to everyone, because that's why everyone hates you," Shizuka told her, calmer this time, but it did nothing to console a flabbergasted Yoshie any. With that rhetoric, Shizuka turned on her heel and left._

_That's when it hit Yoshie. She's all alone now. Without a girl posse._

(end flashback)

More tears climbed out of her eyes, rolling down her freezing red face. They stung her cheeks, but she didn't care. "This is the worst Christmas ever, and that's saying something," Yoshie muttered to herself sadly.

It was at this time that Anzu, with Moonbeam in her pocket, ran down the street happily, hoping to get home. But she stopped when she saw Yoshie sitting on the bench. Anzu put a hand to her face when she saw Yoshie's tears. As much as she hated Yoshie for being a straight up jerk, she couldn't help but wonder what was wrong. Shyly, Anzu walked over to the girl.

"Hey there. You okay?" Anzu asked kindly. Yoshie looked up and found herself disgusted. She wiped her eyes with her sleeve.

'_Oh great. It's goth girl,'_ Yoshie thought bitterly. "What do you want? Go away!" She snapped.

"You seem sad. Wanna talk about it?" Anzu asked again.

Yoshie stood up angrily. "Mind your own business, goth girl! Just go back home and slit your wrists just like all you goths do-" Yoshie wanted to go on a tirade. But something hit her in the back, knocking her unconscious. The same with Anzu. She had absolutely no time to react. Soon, everything went black.

* * *

"Urgh…" Her head was pounding a little, but Anzu found herself lying in the snow, in some forest. She looked around to find that she's surrounded by trees without leaves. "What in the world…?" She looked next to her to find Yoshie lying unconscious. "How did we get here?" Anzu asked. She rummaged through her pocket to pull out her phone...only to find it completely broken and shattered. "Dangit. Who did this?" She grumbled angrily.

"An-chan? You awake?" Moonbeam whispered as she creeped out of Anzu's pocket. Anzu was relieved to see that Moonbeam was unharmed. Thank goodness.

"Moonbeam. What happened?" Anzu asked in a whisper, keeping her voice low so she doesn't wake Yoshie.

"I don't know. I was out cold, too. But I woke up before you two, and I saw what appeared to be some force field shaped like a bubble surrounding us. I think someone, maybe Zenjin or Decebal, deliberately dropped us here," Moonbeam told her doubtfully.

"I'll buy that," Anzu whispered. "Anyway, go and find the others. I'd do it myself but I don't want to leave Inoue here, and I'm afraid that if I transform, she might wake up and find out about my secret. Not only that, my phone's broken."

"Good point. I'll find them. Just be careful, okay?" Moonbeam said before ascending into the sky. Anzu looked up to find that both she and Yoshie were at the bottom of a cliff with a highway on it.

"Ugh...what happened?" Yoshie rubbed her head and finally woke up.

"Oh, good! You're awake!" Anzu exclaimed with some relief. But as soon as Yoshie saw Anzu, she made a contorted face and looked away.

"Get away from me, goth girl!" Yoshie shouted. She tried to stand up, but a jolt of pain shot through her left ankle, and she found herself falling to her knees. "Ow! Owowow!"

"Careful!" Anzu said. She noticed Yoshie's hand was on her left ankle. "You might be hurt. Here, I'll-" Anzu was about to take off Yoshie's ugg to examine the injury, but the uncooperative girl slapped Anzu's hand with her own.

"Get your grummy hands off me! I don't need help from an emo goth!" Yoshie shouted.

But Anzu was not deterred. "Sorry, but I'm helping you whether you like it or not, so deal with it," She told her before yanking off her ugg. Yoshie's ankle is completely red and swollen, probably from the fall. Anzu pulled out a bottle of water, opened the cap, and poured some on her ankle. After that, she pulled out a pretty white and green handkerchief and tied it around Yoshie's ankle. "I know this isn't much, but it's better than nothing."

Yoshie found herself speechless. Anzu was helping her even though she had done nothing but insult her and yell at her like a whiny little spoiled brat. She had to wonder if Anzu didn't care, was deliberately ignoring it, or completely insane. But she had to admit, her ankle did feel better after Anzu finished tying it up. "There. Done and done. I wish I had something better, though."

"Why?"

"Hm?"

The pigtailed girl squinted her eyes at Anzu. "Why are you doing this for me? Are you trying to mock me or something?"

Anzu kept a smile on her face. "Do you really need a reason to help somebody? But anyway, do you have a cell phone on you?"

"No."

"Oh. I wanted to try calling for help."

"Hmph! Even if we did call for help, I'd doubt anyone with half a brain would want to help an emo goth."

"Oh! There's a log! Come on over there and sit. It's better than sitting on this snow," Anzu pulled her up and escorted her to the log. Without question, Yoshie sat down. The log wasn't far from where they were, and they were still visible to anyone who would look down at them from the cliff since the trees didn't have any leaves on them.

"We're doomed," Yoshie grumbled.

"No we're not. I know someone'll find us," Anzu told her reassuringly.

She gave Anzu a doubtful look. "How do you know?"

Anzu couldn't tell her she sent Moonbeam out to find the others, so she just lied right to her face. "I just do. I have to believe in something, don't I? But anyway, since it's snowy here, I recommend that you not fall asleep. If you do, your body'll get cold and you'll die."

"Ugh! I don't wanna diiiiie!" Yoshie whined, but Anzu paid her no heed. "I don't wanna be stuck here forever, and I especially don't wanna be stuck here forever with an emo goth who cuts her wrists!"

Anzu wished she had ear plugs but she ignored her. _'Believe me, I feel you,'_ Anzu thought.

Yoshie was thinking about something else, and she stopped her nasally whining. _'Then again...this is a lot better than...dealing with him...'_ Yoshie thought.

They weren't sure how much time passed. The good thing was, there wasn't any snow falling, so that took away some of the danger. Anzu kept walking around in circles while Yoshie sat on a log, watching her, becoming more and more irritated.

"Ugh! Can you STOP pacing around?! It's annoying!" Yoshie whined.

"I'm not pacing. I'm moving around so I can keep my body warm and my blood circulating. I'd tell you to do it too, but your ankle's busted, so you're gonna have to deal with it," Anzu told her in a casual, matter-of-fact way.

"That's surprising coming from someone who cuts her wrists."

Now Anzu's had it. But she didn't dare lose her temper. She knew there'd be repercussions if she did that, so she kept her cool. "Okay. I'm curious. Who says I cut my wrists?"

"Everyone! All goths do! I saw it on TV!"

"First of all, I don't cut my wrists. I'm smarter than that. Who told you I cut my wrists?"

"Everyone at school!"

"And you just believed it? You didn't even ask for proof?"

Yoshie stopped. She had a good point.

"You really shouldn't believe everything people tell you. A lot of stuff you hear is just a load of crock. Secondly, I'm not emo or a goth," Anzu told her.

"But then why do you wear black clothes all the time?!" Yoshie roared.

"I just do. I just like them. Denim jeans and I don't mix very well, and some of the pants I get are actually pretty comfy. Plus their pockets are nice and big so I can fit anything in them," Anzu told her with a smile, her eyes lighting up a bit.

Yoshie found herself flabbergasted._ 'Seriously?! She just likes the clothes?! That's it?! There's gotta be more to it than that!'_ Yoshie thought, unable to comprehend this deconstruction of the stereotypes about goths she strongly believed. "But don't you hate life? Don't goths always talk about how they hate life and wanna off themselves?"

"Aha! So you ARE under the influence of _'I believe everything that my classmates and the media say that isn't true so I can have a reason to feel like I'm better than everybody'_ syndrome! My diagnosis is complete! Maybe I should be a psychiatrist when I grow up," Anzu exclaimed cheerfully, which only made Yoshie quite irritated.

"Oh, NOW you're mocking me! You think you're sooooo cool hanging out with the loser league and playing your annoying harmonica and acting like you're soooo much better than everybody else!" Yoshie shouted, wishing she could punch this blonde, bespectacled girl in the face.

"Uh, no. If I did act like I'm better than everyone else, I'd be belitting you right about now, and you don't hear me doing that, now do you?" Anzu asked calmly.

Yoshie balled her fists. Another good point. More tears came out. This made Anzu don a concerned look. "Why? Why is everyone stealing my friends away from me?!" This was a first for Anzu. She never saw Yoshie cry before, and the pigtailed girl was never one for crying like this in public. She always thought it was unbecoming. "Why does everyone have friends and I don't?! If I don't have...Toshiko and Shizuka...then...I really am nothing…"

"Uh, you're being irrational," Anzu deadpanned.

"So what?! I can't believe weirdos like you actually get friends! What did you do to deserve it?!" Noth-"

"Be me. Be nice. Actually treat them right. Understand them. Work toward building a platonic relationship. Work out our problems. Support each other. Treat people like people, warts and all. Not make a big deal out of things they can't control," She deadpanned again, like she expected Yoshie to behave this way.

"UUUUGH!" Yoshie screeched. "People like you ruin everything! I just want my life to mean something! I want to enjoy it! I want to have friends to gossip with and go to the mall with! Is that really so bad?!" She roared with tears coming out of her eyes.

"I get it. You're afraid. Afraid of everyone leaving you," Anzu said.

"Eh?"

"Afraid that people won't like the real you. Tell me. What IS the real you? What is it you're afraid of?"

Yoshie didn't know what to say. Anzu single-handedly ripped her apart like she was paper, exposing her true colors. She rolled up one of her sleeves to reveal a purple bruise on her arm.

"My dad's a nut job. He always beats me and my mom like we're his punching bags. Always freaking out over everything, even the way dinner is made," Yoshie muttered. Anzu didn't move. She just stared at the bruise, understandably grossed out, but she didn't dare say anything. Yoshie didn't even look right at Anzu. She was too ashamed to look her in the face. "I don't like going home. I may hate school, but at least I had people I could talk to. At least I felt safe there. Appreciated. Loved."

"Uh, picking on people, spreading rumors, and treating your friends like slaves and butlers doesn't reward you with love, respect, and appreciation," Anzu told her.

"It's just like you said. I am a jerk. I do pick on people and spread rumors. But only because…I don't know what else to do! Being nice hasn't made anything better! I'm sick of always being treated like I'm worthless! But...now I don't have any friends anymore! I just can't deal with all of this!" Yoshie cried louder than before, to the point where Anzu had to cover her ears. "I can't even tell anyone about any of it because they'll think I brought it all on myself and say I deserved it! It's happened to people before!"

"And you believe them?"

"Huh?"

Anzu crossed her arms. "You actually believe all that mumbo jumbo? Nobody's gonna blame you for what's been happening to you. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard."

"But it happens! I know it does! It's happened to other people!"

"Other people, yes, and that's unfortunate. But it doesn't happen with everybody. Come on. You just told me about it and I don't think it's your fault you dad's a domestic abuser or whatnot," Anzu told her in a casual, matter-of-fact way.

Yoshie's eyes widened. She was right. She just spilled her guts to someone she hated, and said someone wasn't making a big deal about it. Yoshie thought she was dreaming for a moment. But then again, even in their dire situation, Anzu put Yoshie before herself by bandaging her ankle. She looked down at her feet and balled her fists. She couldn't believe she had been nothing but cruel to someone who went out of her way to help her. She didn't even roll her sleeve back down so she could hide her bruise.

"I've tried being nice. It doesn't work," Yoshie confessed tersely.

(flashback)

_A seven-year-old Yoshie sat in the dining room, cutting out pieces of construction paper with scissors. She cut out a pink flower, spread some glue on it, and stuck it to a hastily made card she made herself. The card was white, with yellow stars, blue moons, pink flowers, and green trees pasted on it in their respective construction paper colors. Once she finished, she took an indigo colored crayon and wrote the words _'HAPPY FATHER'S DAY DADDY!'_ on it quite sloppily. Some crayon marks got on the table. But she didn't care. Her eyes were wide with joy and anticipation as she drew on the card she made._

_She was sure her dad was going to love it._

_She didn't care about the colossal mess she made on the dining room table. It was completely covered from corner to corner with pieces of construction paper. Yoshie paid it absolutely no heed as she added on some finishing touches. _Creeeeak_. The door opened. With a squeal, Yoshie got her hand made card and showed it to her father, a big, gruff man who really needed to trim his thick, Santa Claus-y beard a little._

"_For you, Daddy! Happy Daddy Day!" Yoshie chirped. She pictured it all in her head. He would take the card and say, "Awww! This is so wonderful! Thanks so much, sweetie! I love you!" and he would pull her into his arms and he would hug her, like she saw other dads do with their kids during Parent's Day at school._

_But he didn't even see it._

_All he did was stare at the paper filled dining room table._

_As soon as he laid eyes on it, he exploded._

"_Did you make that mess over there?!" He roared._

_Yoshie found herself shivering, frozen with fear. She dropped the card. He grabbed it and ripped it all up into little pieces. _RIIIIIIP! RIP RIP RIP!_ All of the shreds floated gently onto the floor. All of Yoshie's hard work was gone, just like that._

"_I want a CLEAN HOUSE, NOT a dumpster, you little idiot! You should know better than to make a big mess in my house! You're in MY house, and your job is to do what I say and be GOOD! But of course you LOVE making me miserable, don't you?!" The angry man pushed all the construction paper off the dining room table, scattering it all over the place._

_That's when a woman came into the room, understandably scared. "Shiro! Calm down! She just wanted to give you a card she made! She's been working hard on it! We'll clean it up-AHH!" She could go no further, as a mighty blow struck her face and made her fall to the floor. She almost hit her head on the corner of the table, but luckily she didn't. But even though she didn't hit the table, it's not like it meant anything._

"_I...I made it for you...don't you like it…?" Yoshie whimpered, feeling like she'd been stepped on by a giant foot._

"_You're so stupid you can't even raise a durn kid decently! I work hard all day long at a boring job, and you idiots go and make the house a big fat mess! I'm paying for the both of you! You can't even do what's expected of you!" Shiro roared as he smacked his poor wife around like she was a punching bag. He grabbed a huge chunk of her hair and threw her into the hallway. Yoshie hid behind the couch, covered her ears, closed her eyes, and cried. She wished she had a better dad, one who didn't yell and hit her mother like that._

"_My friends at work have kids who are decent and well behaved! It's so embarrassing I can't even show my face to my relatives!"_

"_I'M SORRY! I'M SORRY!" The woman begged for mercy, but the man proceeded to try and step on her like she was an ugly bug._

_All Yoshie was trying to do was be nice. She thought she was decent. She felt she was more decent than those smelly boys who pick their noses and show it to everybody during lunch. Why does he think her giving him a Father's Day card was wrong? She couldn't understand. She wanted to get the phone and call someone, but the last time she did that Shiro took the phone and told the person on the other line a bunch of lies to make them not come, and it always worked._

_Yoshie wished she could just disappear._

(end flashback)

"Jeez. What an idiot," Anzu said.

"Yay, something we both agree on," Yoshie grumbled. But in her heart, she was bursting with joy. Anzu didn't blame her for her dad's abusive tendencies!

"You should call someone. Get him arrested. It'll get worse if you just let it go on, and being a jerk and picking on other people won't make it better," Anzu told her. "Look, life can be unfair. I've been through it to. I was scared of my mom. In a way, she was like that, and all I wanted to do was run away. I used to dream of getting on a shiny sports car and driving far far away, going on road trips and seeing the world. North America, France, Italy, Spain, Mexico, all those places. But I got through it, both by myself and with my friends helping me. That's how you come out on top with those chumps. Don't blame yourself for stuff other people do! You got that?"

"Is that way...you just ignored all the mean things I said about you?"

"Yeah. I honestly don't give a rat's hat about what anybody thinks, and I still don't. All I wanna do is enjoy my life and be myself," Anzu said.

Yoshie looked down at her fists again. _'Wow...I never knew any of this about her. Then again, she never knew any of this about me. I guess...we all have things we need to face...and she's right. About everything. I have to deal with it somehow, or nothing'll get better!'_ Yoshie thought, squeezing her fingers into her fists tightly.

"Naive and idealistic fools, aren't you?" A slithery voice asked out of nowhere. Anzu gasped and turned around to find Decebal standing in front of them. He swung his hand and a ray of light appeared from it, coming right toward Anzu. She didn't have time to even pull out her Heart Lighter.

Someone else, however, found time to push her out of the way.

"NO!" With a scream, Yoshie leaped off the log and pushed Anzu out of the light's path. The light hit her, sending her against the cliff, and her Soul Portal appeared.

"Inoue!"

"Get out of here! Quick! Get someone! I don't care who! Just do it!" Yoshie screamed as Decebal grasped her Soul Portal and dunked his head in it, making her scream even harder.

For the first time in her life, she didn't care about someone's appearance or interests. She just wanted someone, anyone, to come and save her!

"Yoshie…" Anzu couldn't believe it. Yoshie actually saved her. Perhaps she does have some good in her after all, good that's just been squashed by the bad things happening to her.

A spark of courage exploded into a mighty blaze in Anzu's heart as she charged at Decebal. "LET HER GO!" She punched him with her bare hands and tried to force him off, but nothing she did worked. He pushed her off and yanked out her soul.

"Come forth!" Decebal made the soul orb turn into a giant prairie dog. High enough to reach the top of the cliff, but not enough to climb it.

"You put us here on purpose, didn't you?!" Anzu yelled as she ran to Yoshie's vessel. The prairie dog, not caring for the humans beneath it, tried to eat some dead tree branches.

"Yes. NOT guilty as charged," Decebal hissed. By not guilty as charged, he meant to convey that he doesn't feel any guilt for his actions. "Honestly, this girl deserved what she got. Her father probably wanted her to learn her place in this world as a woman who only exists to serve her future husband," Decebal told Anzu in an icy voice.

Anzu got out her Heart Lighter. "I am SO gonna bash your brains in for that!" She wasted no time transforming into Cure Dawn and attempting to punch his lights out. The problem is, he knocked her away like she was a rag doll. She didn't give up, and she kept trying to get at him, but nothing she did worked.

"The girl has to learn that she only exists to be a tool to be used by anyone and everyone. She can't escape her fate, nor can she change it," Decebal sneered.

Cure Dawn was about to try and pummel him again for being so arrogant, but someone else did. The giant prairie dog smacked him with its tail, sending him into a tree.

"What?!"

"_I...I am not...anyone's tool…"_ The prairie dog-Yoshie-growled. Cure Dawn couldn't believe it. _"Stop...telling me what to do...I'm not...your plaything! I am a person with dreams, hobbies, weaknesses, everything else! I decide what I want to do with myself! Not you!"_ The prairie dog roared as it tried to slash him.

"Daaaawn!" Down from the top of the cliff came Cures Twilight, Starlight, Dusk, Sealight, and Skylight, along with all the fairies.

Cure Dawn made her chains of light bind Yoshie so she'd be still for them to purify. "Bless us with your shine, holy light! Pretty Cure...Shining Light!" The light turned the prairie dog into a soul orb, and Cure Dawn put it back in Yoshie's body. With a grunt, Decebal teleported away before the girls could interrogate him.

The fairies tracked down Yoshie's house and the girls dropped her off there. But ever since that Christmas, they wouldn't see or hear Yoshie for an entire month.

* * *

December closed its doors, with January coming right in. The weather was still bitterly cold, which made many people wish it was Christmas again so they'd have something to focus on instead of how freezing it is. School started up again, much to the chagrin of some. Strangely, everyone noticed that Yoshie hadn't come to school lately. She had been absent for about a month. Silently, Anzu worried whether she was okay or not. She tried to visit her house once, but Yoshie wasn't there. Nobody answered the door. But other things happened as well. Fukiko frequently went to the rehabilitation center to watch Kyoya practice walking again. Even she was amazed at how determined he is.

But January did bring forth something amazing. One day, everyone (Fukiko included) went to Kyoya's house for some fun. That was when they saw it. Riko ran through the house, looking for Kayoko and Jiroemon, her heart racing and her legs burning. But she didn't care. They needed to hear about this. Finally, she burst through the door to their bedroom, not caring about the fact that she saw them hugging. "Kayoko-san! Jiro-san!"

"What is it, Riko-chan? You look like you ran a marathon," Kayoko asked, confused.

Riko kept on panting, but she didn't care. "It's Kyo-chan! He...he...he…" Her lack of breath made it hard to get the words out, but she did. "Kyo-chan's walking on his own!"

"Eh?!"

Riko dragged Kyoya's parents by the arms to take them to the back yard. She's so excited she can't stop to tell them what's going on. But they didn't mind. Once they stepped foot on the back porch, they saw it.

Everyone was in the back yard, watching.

Kyoya was on his feet, walking all on his own. Without crutches or a wheelchair. He was doing it slowly, but he was walking.

Kayoko put her hands to her mouth. "Oh my goodness...he's finally walking!" Kayoko hugged Jiroemon again.

"Come on, you slowpoke! I wanna see some determination!" Marina yelled from one side of the fence. Kyoya smiled and kept going.

"Oh, you'll see it," Kyoya muttered. One foot in front of the other. Rinse and repeat.

"You can do it, Kyoya-kun!" Fukiko cried out happily.

"Keep going!" Umi yelled, her hands cupping the sides of her mouth. "You're almost there! Don't give up until it's over!"

Finally, after many minutes, Kyoya caught up to Marina, and he didn't fall even when he got to her. Riko trapped him in a tight hug. "You did it, Kyo-chan! You walked! You really walked all on your own!" Riko cheered as she hugged Kyoya. Anzu, Fukiko, Hotaru, Sorane, and Marina joined in. The fairies did too, but they did it secretly so Kyoya's parents wouldn't freak out. Soon, Jiroemon and Kayoko joined in on the group hug.

"I knew you could do it, Kyoya! I just knew you would!" Jiroemon exclaimed tearfully. He was the happiest father in the world right about now.

"I know. I'm glad I didn't give up," Kyoya said.

"Hey! Now that you can walk again, you might be able to run later on!" Riko exclaimed.

"I still need to work on that, but yeah. I'll run when I'm ready, and then we'll have our race!" Kyoya said.

News of Kyoya walking again circulated through school. Not only that, Kyoya came to school without his wheelchair. Even Daizo couldn't believe what he was seeing. He was convinced Kyoya would be in a wheelchair forever. But for once, he was glad to be wrong. Not only that, Yoshie returned. She approached Anzu with a shy look on her face.

"Listen. Umm...thanks for...helping me last month," Yoshie told her shyly.

Anzu smiled. "You're welcome. Thanks for helping me too," Anzu said.

"Umm...I called the police on my dad. They arrested him. My mom and I...we're working to get back on our feet," Yoshie stammered.

"Good to know."

"Also...I can't believe I'm saying this," Yoshie shuffled her feet and kept looking at the floor as she talked. But Anzu could see the sincerity in her eyes. "I...I...I'm sorry. For everything. For being a big fat jerk. For spreading rumors. For...calling you and your friends all those names."

Anzu put a hand on Yoshie's shoulder. "It's okay. Hey! Do you wanna sit at our lunch table?"

Yoshie did a double take. "What?! But...but...won't they get mad? I mean...I've been cruel to them…"

"I've already told them about what happened down the cliff. I'm sure they'll come around," Anzu said.

For once, Yoshie found herself smiling. Not in a mean way, but a genuine, grateful, happy smile that she thought she'd never be able to show. She felt like bursting into song.


	38. Dark Secrets Brought To Light!

_**Trigger warnings for: discussion of child abuse**_

* * *

Chapter 35: Decebal Is Back?! Dark Secrets Brought to Light!

Kyoya always knew he'd be able to walk again. He never gave up, endured intense physical therapy every single day, and pushed his body to the limit. He didn't want to live his life in a wheelchair. He wanted to get back on his feet no matter what. And he did. Once he walked on his own, he found himself happier than he'd ever been. One of his goals has been achieved! But now he had another goal to pursue: running. He may be able to walk now, but his dream of being able to run again seemed closer than ever.

However, a surprise would await him. One day, he sat in his room working on a project for school. To be more specific, a new bottle rocket. Lovebeam sat on his bed, happily sewing some gloves by hand while humming a little tune. After a short while, he found himself in the mood for a snack, so he decided to slowly walk downstairs to grab a Kit Kat bar from the snack cabinet. He could share it with Lovebeam too. And yes, he could walk down the stairs now! But he had to do it slowly and gently, or else he'd fall. He kept his hands on the railing so he wouldn't fall. He made sure to be extra careful. But when he got to the bottom floor, he heard his mother yelp in the dining room.

"What?! You...you found this woman?!" Kayoko yelped. Kyoya walked to the dining room to find Kayoko sitting at the table with the detective from before, Mr. Fukasaku. Something she said made him interested.

"Did you find that Katsunuma lady?" Kyoya asked. Kayoko was so shocked, she didn't even bother to shoo him out of the dining room.

Mr. Fukasaku nodded. "We've done some digging. It was hard, but we managed to find her current residence," He said as he handed them his cell phone. It has a picture of a small hospital on it. There's a sign a few feet away from the entrance that reads _'Shining Light Hospice.'_

"Shining Light...Hospice?" Kayoko read the sign on the picture.

"What's a hospice?" Kyoya asked. He knew hospitals like he knew the back of his hand, but not a hospice.

"A hospice is a special medical facility where terminally ill patients reside to receive care before they die, and doctors and nurses try to make their upcoming deaths as painless as possible," Mr. Fukasaku explained lucidly. "Anyway, we found out that Katsunuma-san developed lung cancer caused by her chain smoking habit. She also developed type 2 diabetes, and her morbid obesity and refusal to receive early treatment resulted in her leg getting amputated. She was admitted there about a year or so ago when she was found on the streets by a local nurse."

"Do they allow people to visit them? Like, people who aren't part of their family?" Kayoko asked.

"They do, but you have to arrange an appointment," Mr. Fukasaku clarified.

"Thank you so very much, Fukasaku-san. You have no idea how much we appreciate this," Kayoko told him gratefully, shaking his hand quite hard.

"You're quite welcome, Mitomo-san...oh?" Mr. Fukasaku said. Then he noticed Kyoya on his feet. "Wow! You're on your feet! Congratulations!"

Kyoya rubbed his hand through his hair. "Thanks."

"You're strong to have gotten this far. Good luck in your future endeavors," Mr. Fukasaku told him kindly before leaving.

As soon as he left, Kayoko looked up the hospice's phone number on the internet, picked up the phone, and called the place. "Hello? Hi, my name is Mitomo Kayoko, and I want to make an appointment to visit someone. Yes. The person's name is Katsunuma Mana. Yes. Yes. No, she's not family, but I have something I want to ask her. Yes. Yes. I can do next Sunday. Thank you so much! I appreciate it. Thank you for your time. Bye," Kayoko said before hanging up the phone.

"Hey Mom. Can I go with you? I wanna see the person who kidnapped my brother," Kyoya asked.

"Oh, we'll see her alright. I'm gonna get some answers out of her even if I have to beat them out of her!" Kayoko exclaimed. Kyoya took a few steps back, a little cowed by her change in demeanor.

'_Wow. She's dead serious about this,'_ Kyoya thought. This definitely wasn't the same upbeat, cheerful woman that was his mother. But he went upstairs and told Lovebeam all about it.

"They really found her?! And you're gonna see her next week?" Lovebeam asked.

"Heck yeah! Mom and I are itching to chew her out on everything!" Kyoya told her.

"Can I come with you?"

"But don't you hate this kind of stuff?" He just couldn't picture someone as peppy and fashion-savvy as Lovebeam being in a hospice. The two just wouldn't mix.

"I do, but I wanna see this lady too."

"Sure. But you really gotta be careful or everyone will see you."

Lovebeam crossed her heart. "I promise."

The week seemed to drag on forever. But finally, Sunday marched in like a lion. The hospice wasn't far from their house. It's right next to the hospital, which was understandable since they were both owned by the same director. Kayoko and Kyoya went inside and approached the reception desk. A lady popped her head up from her computer. "Good morning."

"We're here to see Katsunuma Mana-san," Kayoko told her without mincing words. "We have an appointment."

"Does she know you're here?"

"No."

"You're not going to see Katsunuma, are you?" An old woman asked, prompting Kayoko and Kyoya to turn around. Lovebeam stuck her head out from Kyoya's backpack to see. An old woman in her late eighties with very short, white hair cut in a boyish style and blue eyes approached them with a worried look on her wrinkled face. She was wearing a brown, green, and yellow sweater, blue jeans, white socks, and pink slippers.

"That sweater doesn't look very flattering on her," Lovebeam mumbled to herself. Kyoya didn't hear a thing she said.

"Yes, we're going to see her," Kyoya answered.

"Oh! I suggest you stay far away from that woman as possible! She's crazy, I tell you! Foul tempered and more rotten than the devil himself! She goes on and on about how she took care of a little boy and treated him like trash! She kept saying stuff about him taking her daughter away and that he's a sinned child who deserved to be punished for his crimes and all that cockamamie. Honestly, half the residents here are saner than she is! We all avoid her like the plague! She's cruel and mean, inside and out!"

Kayoko put a hand on Kyoya's shoulder. "Thanks for the warning. But we have to see her. It's important," Kayoko told her.

"Come right this way," A nurse escorted Kayoko and Kyoya through the halls to show them Mana's room. Kyoya and Lovebeam watched as people walked about, some patients, some nurses, some family members. He never knew places like this existed before. He knew about nursing homes, but not hospices. Soon, they arrived at a lounge, which is completely empty. "Here she is."

Kyoya and Lovebeam saw a woman in a wheelchair sitting in the center of a lobby, doing nothing. The woman was very morbidly obese. Her arms and legs had so much weight on them they had to wonder if she could even move them. Huge rolls of skin protruded from between her pants and shirt, exposed for all to see. Her face was extremely pudgy, framed with lifeless, scraggly brown hair that curled down past her shoulders. There was an oxygen tank attached to the back of her wheelchair, with a nasal cannula attached to it, wrapped around Mana's face. She was wearing a short sleeved salmon pink shirt and soft gray sweatpants.

_'Wow. Her fashion sense is even worse than that old woman's,'_ Lovebeam thought. _'But more than that...she's the one who kidnapped Kyo-chan's brother? She must be really horrible.'_

"Katsunuma-san. You have visitors," The nurse told her politely.

"Tell'em to go to Hades! I ain't interested!" Mana snapped in a gravely, husky voice. The nurse left the room, but Kayoko and Kyoya stayed.

Kayoko donned a stern look on her face. She grabbed a chair, placed it in front of Mana, and sat in front of her. Kyoya walked next to her. She grimaced a little when he saw the sewn up stump that was Mana's left leg. Everything past the knee was amputated, so all that was left was a stump with some old stitching on it. Kyoya got a chair and sat down next to Kayoko. Lovebeam stayed in Kyoya's backpack, but still managed to get a good look at Mana.

He felt a chill go up his spine when he saw Mana's indifferent, utterly soulless brown eyes. They had absolutely nothing but scorn and hatred swimming in them. "I ain't interested in no small talk."

"Too late. We're here now, and we're not leaving until you give us answers."

"Answers for what?"

"You know what!" Kayoko yelled. "You kidnapped my son fifteen years ago! His name was Yuusuke!"

At first, Mana said nothing. But she looked up and once she laid eyes on Kyoya, her eyes widened. "You...look so much like him."

"Cut the garbage and spill the beans. Why'd you kidnap my brother? What did we ever do to you that was so bad? Huh? And we don't want any funny business either!" Kyoya exclaimed.

Mana closed her eyes. "It's nothing personal. My daughter's womb was cursed. The sinned child died after birth. She died, too. Nothing good comes out of sin. A child of sin born from sin brings nothing but trouble and calamity."

"In English, please?" Kayoko asked bitterly.

"Yeah, I hired someone to take him. Big deal," Mana hissed.

"Big deal?!" Kayoko roared, standing up from her chair, appalled by her complete lack of remorse for what she did. "Do you know how much I've suffered because of you?! Fifteen years I spent looking for him, wondering what happened to him! And now I found out that apparently you've been abusing him and treating him like less than human!"

Mana gave her a hateful glare. Kayoko gave Mana her own death glare.

"Someone needed to take responsibility for my daughter's death. Someone needed to remind him of his crime, make sure he doesn't forget. My anger needed to go somewhere. He deserved all of my anger for killing my daughter," Mana hissed without pity or remorse in her voice.

Kyoya wanted to punch this woman in the face. Neither he nor Kayoko could believe what they were hearing. It all amounted to one thing. "So...you basically kidnapped my brother because you couldn't move on and decided you needed someone to blame for it. Is that it?"

"Yes. I regret nothing. Children who commit murder through birth are spawns of the devil. He deserved every piece of my hatred for taking my only happiness away from me," Mana hissed. A malicious smile appeared on her face. "It gave me great pleasure to break that little beast and crush all of his hope. Besides, I needed an outlet for my anger."

_SLAP!_ Kayoko hit that woman so hard she left a handprint on her chubby face. Mana kept her eyes closed and acted like she didn't feel a thing, but even Kyoya was horrified. He knew his mother was not a woman anyone should cross, but this fat woman found enjoyment in abusing her child for her own amusement. In a way, she rightfully deserved it. No one was in the room to see her get slapped, much to Kyoya's relief. If one of the nurses saw Kayoko hit Mana, they would have called the police.

Kayoko's eyes looked like they were going to burst into flames. "You're sick, you know that?! You say my child is the devil's spawn, but honestly, that describes YOU more than anything! You're a freak, a monster without a human heart! Did you even think about what you've done?! The people you've made suffer?! His feelings?! Our feelings?! Any of the consequences you've created?! You're not guilty about it at all, are you?! All you care about is blaming someone for your daughter's death instead of just moving on!"

Mana said nothing, which told Kayoko and Kyoya all they needed to know.

Kyoya couldn't resist saying this. "If your daughter were alive, she'd probably hate your guts for doing all of this. She wouldn't have wanted you to do all of this."

That did it for Mana. Her eyes widened quite quickly, and she tried to get out of her wheelchair, but couldn't because of the oxygen tank and the nasal cannula. "YOU KNOW NOTHING, YOU TRASH! My daughter was everything to me! My only happiness, but he took it away from me! That child is a monster out to get me!" Mana roared. "The devil sent him to me so he can rub my daughter's death in my face and brag about it! Someone needed to remind him of his crime! He needed to take responsibility! That child is a freak without a human heart! You should be happy I took him away from you! He was going to ruin your lives! If he hadn't been born, my darling Chisa would still be alive, and then I wouldn't be in this prison!"

"Doesn't that describe you more than anything? You stoop so low as to kidnap a kid-MY BROTHER-just to ruin his life for your own amusement! If anything, you're the freak without a human heart! I can see why they didn't put you in jail. They thought this would be better. I really hope you suffer and die a horrible, painful death," Kyoya told her without mincing words.

Normally, Kayoko would balk at her son saying such words to an older woman. If she had some sense, she would have scolded him, as it was rude and inappropriate to say bad things to his elders, no matter the reason. But her hatred for this woman blinded her, and she felt Kyoya had a right to know about his brother and the person who hurt him. She was never one to mollycoddle him and protect him from everything that was even remotely objectionable. He proved that with his maturity and determination, before and after the accident.

"I only have one last question. Where is Yuusuke?" Kayoko hissed.

Mana looked away silently.

"Answer the question! Where is he?! You better not lie!" Kayoko roared.

"That, I don't know. Someone took him away as I was rightfully punishing him for his existence. They held me down and took him away. At first, I thought it was the police, but they weren't wearing police uniforms. One of them looked like some king from the Roman Empire," Mana hissed, keeping her scornful glare.

"Cut the garbage right now! Where is Yuusuke?! Is he alive or not?!"

"I just toldja the truth! He was alive when they took him! I dunno where he is! I swear!" Mana hissed.

Kayoko didn't feel satisfied with that answer, but she did see some truth in her eyes. She wanted to suffocate this poor excuse of a human being. But she knew she couldn't. Not in front of her son. With that, she just left. Kyoya was about to go after her, but he had something else to say to Mana.

"Listen. I don't know what you've gone through, and I'm sure you're upset about your daughter's death...but you're not the only one who's suffering. My parents have been suffering for fifteen years. Just because you can't let go of your hate or move on...doesn't mean it's right for you to hurt people, especially to use them as outlets for your hate. You don't see me hating everyone because I got in a car accident and couldn't walk!" Kyoya told her before leaving.

When Kayoko got in the car, she burst into tears. She bellowed and buried her face in her hands. Kyoya knew why, and it really was understandable. To have your child taken away just because someone needed an outlet for their hatred and couldn't find healthier methods to cope with her grief...Kyoya knew his mother needed a much needed hug, and he wasted no time giving one to her. It didn't make Kayoko stop crying, but it did console her somewhat. After what seemed to be a full half hour, she stopped crying.

"I'm sorry, Kyoya. I really shouldn't be-"

"It's okay, Mom. I don't mind. You deserve to cry once in a while, too."

"I just...my Yuusuke was suffering and I never noticed! I wish I could have been able to save him! We don't even know if he's alive or dead! I...I never should have taken him to the hospital that day!"

"Mom, I bet she would have done it whether you took him there or not, and if she didn't, she might have gotten a hold of someone else's kid. Who knows what she could have done. And you didn't know it was gonna happen. You can't see into the future," Kyoya told her reassuringly.

"Good point…" Kayoko muttered before turning on the ignition. "I...I could really go for some crab cakes. Want to grab lunch while we're out?"

"Sure. I could go for some burgers."

* * *

Hotaru sat at her desk, solving some calculus problems in her textbook. She never was a big fan of calculus, but she always managed to get decent grades. She only managed to solve about five problems within two full hours. She would have solved some more if all the noise in the bathroom next door hadn't gone on for fifteen whole minutes.

"Umi! Are you done in there yet?!" Sorane banged on the bathroom door repeatedly, demanding that Umi come out. "I need to take a shower! Stop hogging the bathroom!"

"I'm not done yet, Neechan!" Umi argued from inside the bathroom, her voice being slightly muffled by the cacophony of the hair dryer.

"Come on! You've been in there for twenty minutes!"

"You spend way more time in the bathroom than I do!"

Hotaru facepalmed. She had never been through this kind of experience before, though this was because she was an only child until now. Finally, the hair dryer noise stopped, and the door creaked open. Hotaru could hear Sorane's feet stamping into the bathroom before a yelp made her flinch. "My God, Umi! There's water everywhere! Why didn't you put the blow dryer away?!"

"You keep yelling at me to get out!"

"Umi! If the dryer's exposed to water when it's plugged in, it could have electrocuted you!"

_'Do they argue like this every day?'_ Hotaru thought. She couldn't help but wonder if they quarreled like this back when their parents were still alive. She hoped this wouldn't be an everyday occurrence, as she liked her peace and quiet. Most of all, she needed to concentrate and get her work done or her grades would slip.

"I would have cleaned it up if you didn't make me get out!"

"Hotaru's family took us in and this is how you repay them?! Why do you have to be so messy?!"

That did it for Hotaru. She slammed her hands on the desk and stamped over to the bathroom. She found Umi and Sorane in the bathroom, arguing like usual until Hotaru shouted over them. "Can you PLEASE keep it down?! I'm trying to study!"

Umi and Sorane squeezed their eyes shut and shrugged their shoulders, Hotaru's voice was that loud. It managed to make them stop yelling. Umi ran back into her room, whereas Sorane closed the bathroom door and began her shower. But not before she muttered, "Sorry."

The noise finally quieted down. Hotaru let out a sigh of relief. Now she could get back to studying. But she happened to pass by Umi's room, and stopped. She couldn't believe how messy it suddenly became! Shirts, pants, and skirts were strung about all over the bed and floor. Some books were scattered on the floor as well, some face down. Umi's covers had been hastily pulled off of her bed, folded in a very messy bundle, and one of her pillow cases had come off of her pillow, hanging by at least two corners. Hotaru found Umi lying on the floor, looking underneath her bed.

"What in the world?"

"Hotaru-chan! Have you seen my Heart Lighter anywhere?" Umi pulled herself out from underneath the bed. "I know I put it around here somewhere, but I can't seem to find it!"

Without a word, Hotaru kneeled down on the floor and helped Umi look for it. "Are you...always this messy?"

Umi let out an exasperated sigh. "Yeah. Sorry. I'm too disorganized for my own good. Everybody says that, even Sorane."

A glint of green caught Hotaru's attention. A heart shaped cap peeked out from the front pocket in Umi's backpack. "I found it," Hotaru pointed to her backpack.

"Ohh! Silly me! I keep forgetting I put it in my bag! Thanks!" Umi laughed after pulling out her Heart Lighter.

"You're welcome. Let's clean this room up, shall we?"

"Yeah! Let's!"

Although Umi was never one to like cleaning, having Hotaru help out made it a lot easier. Plus, it helped Umi's initial anger simmer down. After folding everything up and putting everything back in their designated places, the room was back to being squeaky clean. But it didn't stop the arguments. Despite Hotaru having her room all to herself, she could still hear Sorane and Umi arguing from their room.

"Umi! Get your foot out of my face!"

"You stop talking in your sleep! It's annoying!"

The arguments went on so much that Hotaru tried everything to keep herself calm. Pushing the pillow on her head didn't work. Completely covering herself in her blankets had no effect either. By the time breakfast had come around, dark, heavy bags hung from the bottom of her eyes. "Morning..." Hotaru grumbled.

Sojiro almost found himself aghast. He never saw bags under Hotaru's eyes before. "Goodness. You don't look so good. Did you not sleep well?"

Hotaru wasted no time glaring at Sorane. "I would have if they hadn't been making so much noise all night."

Sorane clasped her hands together. "Sorry!"

"Me too," Umi piped in before she ate some white rice.

Hotaru was quick to get herself together, eat some breakfast, and hop on the bus right on time. Umi walked to school just like usual, leaving Sorane alone with Kyouichi. Sojiro left to go to the Sparkle Diner, where he worked as a chef. Sorane noticed Kyouichi in the basement, inspecting some large tires. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"That you, Sora? Nah, I think I got it," Kyouichi replied, sitting up and wiping some sweat off his face. "It'll be a while before we can sign you back to your old school."

Sorane shook her head. "Oh no, I'm not worried about that."

Kyouichi could hear a twinge of worry in her voice. He stood up and put a hand on her shoulder. "I can tell you're worried. Especially about Hotaru."

Sorane looked down at her feet. "I...I feel like we're invading her space and ruining everything for her. Umi and I tend to fight a lot over stupid things, and I don't want to annoy her, especially since...she was an only child before you and Sojiro-san adopted us."

"You're not invading our space or ruining everything. We all need time to adjust to this new experience, that's all. It'll be hard, but I think we'll all get through it," Kyouichi said. "Besides, you and Umi-chan deserve better than going through trash cans and running around on the streets. Hotaru knows that, too," Sorane couldn't help but notice how confident his voice sounded, like he told this to a lot of people. "Just give it some time. Sorry you and Umi have to be cramped in the same room. We do have an extra room I plan on cleaning out, so I can probably make it your room."

Sorane blushed and continued to look away from him. "You don't have to do so much."

With a big smile, Kyouichi wrapped his arm around Sorane and pulled her close. "I do it because I love you, that's why!" He leaned closer. "To be honest," He whispered. "Sojiro and I did always want another child."

Sorane let out a giggle. "I don't believe you!" She mused before prying herself out of Kyouichi's grasp.

"But really, just be you. We can get through this. Hey! Once I'm done with this here, want to go out for a bit? Maybe the aquarium, the park-"

"There's an aviary around here, right?"

"Yes."

Sorane's eyes sparkled with anticipation, and with a big smile she clasped both of her hands together. "Can we go there? It's been a long time since I've been to the aviary!"

Kyouichi smiled. "Alrighty then! The aviary it is!"

* * *

"Wow, Hotaru-chan. You look like you didn't sleep a wink," Sasami said as she put an accessory in her pale brown curls.

Hotaru's head was planted on her desk in homeroom, face down. Hikage, Sasami, and Nobuo all surrounded her with curious and concerned expressions. "What kept you up all night?" Nobuo asked.

"Sorane and Umi, that's who..." Hotaru mumbled.

"Ah, I see. I feel you," Nobuo piped in. "My brother's computer was in my room, and I would always get mad whenever he'd use it long after I'd be in bed, especially on school days. Whenever I told him to get off, he always told me to shut up. Eventually, they moved it to his room once they got enough room in there. Plus he always plays loud music on his I-Pod player."

"Sorane and Umi are those girls your dads adopted, right?" Sasami asked.

Groggily, Hotaru pulled her face out from her desk and nodded, her eyes still heavy from lack of sleep. "Don't get me wrong. I love them, I really do, but...I've always been an only child until now. I hope their arguing doesn't become a regular thing, and...I don't know how to deal with siblings, especially since I used to always want a brother or a sister."

"Siblings can be stressful," Hikage added. "But when the going gets tough, the tough get going, I always say. Just try to be there for them and help them out when you can. Who knows? Maybe it'll be fun to have sisters."

"I'll try."

Thankfully, the school day was mild, and when lunch time came around, Hotaru was back to her old self. She was happy to find that when she opened her bento box, there were cute star shaped rice balls inside, with little faces on them, along with lettuce, karaage, broccoli, tamagoyaki, and takoyaki. Sojiro always knew what Hotaru liked in her lunch. She was grateful to have good parents who loved her.

* * *

Zenjin sat on a rooftop, chomping on an apple and chewing it with his mouth open. He didn't care if this was bad manners. Why does everyone care about manners anyway? There's no point to them, he assumed. All he cared about was finding this woman and giving her what he felt she rightfully deserved. But no matter how much he ate, the hollow, empty feeling in his chest cavity never faded away. It formed right as Decebal and Beileag abandoned him, and it hadn't been filled ever since.

"I wish I could figure out where she is. That way, I'd be there by now," Zenjin mused to himself. He was about to eat more of his apple until he saw something float on the street.

Someone with long, flowing green hair.

Could it be…?

No, it had to be!

Zenjin wasted no time flying off the rooftop and catching up to the green haired man. The same green haired man who raised him, taught him everything that made him who he is today, and abandoned him on that desert in Rozaniela.

"Going somewhere, Decebal?" Zenjin sneered.

Decebal tried to leave, but Zenjin snapped his fingers, and ropes of vines wrapped around the Shakespearian dressed man, trapping him in place. Zenjin put a hand on his hip. "I've been looking all over for you!"

"You've mastered the Energia's power. You've become quite powerful," Decebal said in an icy voice.

"Cut the mind games! I want answers NOW! Why didn't you help me when that purple girl almost tried to kill me?! Better yet, why did you leave me all alone?!" Zenjin roared.

At first, Decebal didn't answer. His silence made Zenjin's anger simmer even more.

"Answer me! I thought we were in this together! You're the one who told me to pursue the Energia in the first place! You raised me and taught me everything! Why would you just leave me there?! Aren't you happy that I got the Energia?!" Zenjin yelled.

"No. I wanted you to get it for ME," Decebal hissed.

"Eh?" Zenjin's eyes slowly grew large.

"I'm the one that wants the Energia. I want it for myself. I wanted to decimate that nauseating love-love planet Rozaniela and bring Ghislain and Malgorzata to their knees for taking those humans from Earth and depriving them of their chance to endure hardship and discover their true potential," Decebal began, his icy voice unchanging. "If I had someone to get it for me, I could use my connections with the King to get them inside, tell them the passwords to the security systems, and have them take the Energia and hand them to me. That's why I adopted you and raised you to pursue revenge, so I could have you take it and give it to me. But...you kept it for yourself."

Zenjin's eyes grew wider and wider. His mouth was open, but his jaw wouldn't drop. He thought his world was shattered beyond repair before, but now it was completely decimated a hundred times over. The vines withered away, turning brown and shriveled up, freeing Decebal. He didn't want to leave just yet.

"So...you only raised me...so you could use me?" Zenjin muttered.

"Pretty much. I regret nothing," Decebal said. "You're such a stupid child to think I cared about you. You were so easy to manipulate."

Zenjin couldn't believe it. He thought it was a dream. It had to be. But it was all real. If Decebal left him that day, then...that pretty much proved it. He never cared about Zenjin at all, only about using him to fulfill his own twisted goals. The one piece of heaven Zenjin thought he had was stomped on and blown away by the frigid winter wind.

"But...but...I THOUGHT YOU LOVED ME!" Zenjin roared as he fell to his knees. "Was what we had nothing but a big fat lie?!"

An image of a broken Sunbeam flashed through his mind. She said something similar. _"Was the friendship we had just a big fat lie?!"_

"Oh my God...was this what she felt when...I cut her off?" Zenjin asked, brushing a hand through his silver hair.

Decebal gave him an icy glare. "There's no one out there who truly cares about you. You're nothing but trash. You only exist to be used by everyone to their convenience. If you really hate this world so much, go kill yourself. You're nothing but a waste of space."

Decebal was about to leave until a mighty roar and a ray of light stopped him from doing so. A black ray of light hit him so hard it sent him flying into a tree. With another animal-like roar, Zenjin grabbed Decebal's collar and punched him in the face. Twice. Thrice. _Bam. Bam bam bam_. Zenjin wanted to knock the living daylights out of him. He deserved it!

"I HATE YOU!" Zenjin roared as he tried to punch Decebal senseless. But the green haired man grabbed his fist and flipped Zenjin over like he was practicing judo. With that, Decebal teleported away, leaving a heartbroken Zenjin all alone on the street.

Zenjin tried to get up, but he fell right back on the concrete. He couldn't find the energy to blow anything up, he was that upset. He looked to the sky and let out yet another bloodcurdling scream.

* * *

"Hey Mom. I'm back," Marina said as she came through the door. Marina threw off her shoes and walked into the room with just her socks on. It's a tradition in Japan where people remove their shoes before going into the house in order to keep the house clean.

"Hi, Mari-chan," Hatoko said. Marina sat down at the dining room table and decided to start on her homework early. Hatoko sat across from her with her hands folded, looking a little pensive. "Um...Mari-chan?"

"Yeah?"

"There's...something I've been meaning to tell you for a while."

"What is it?"

"I...for the past few months...I've been seeing someone."

Marina looked up from her homework, suddenly curious. "Define seeing someone."

"Well...I didn't want to say anything because it wasn't set in stone yet. But...I have good news. I...I...I have a boyfriend now," Hatoko told her shyly.

A radiant smile lit Marina's face up like a light bulb. "Wow! Seriously?!"

"Yep. We hit it off some time ago, and he asked me out on a date last week, and I said yes."

"That's awesome, Mom! What's he like?" Marina asked cheerfully, curious to know.

Hatoko smiled. "His name is Miyata Takashi," She began. "He's about the same age as me, and he's very funny, kind, interesting, and helpful. He's very good at writing poetry and telling jokes. He's been very good to me ever since he first started his job at my office. I'm thinking about inviting him over so he can meet you sometime. Would you like that?"

"Of course! I'd love to meet him!" Marina exclaimed with a smile. But then her smile suddenly faded. Hatoko took notice. "But...he's not perfect, is he? How do you know he's not hiding some secret dark side? Doesn't that happen? I don't want you to get tricked or hurt."

"Don't worry, Mari-chan. If it turns out he's secretly a jerk, then I won't stay with him. But I don't want to live my life being scared of everything anymore. We won't know until we try, right?" Hatoko told her reassuringly. She had a good point.

Marina smiled again. _'She's right. Mom deserves a little happiness after what she's been through. I really shouldn't be such a worrywart,'_ Marina thought as she went back to her homework.

* * *

"Hi! I'm back!" Umi raced through the Minamigawa door and ran inside the house. Sorane gasped upon seeing Umi not take her shoes off.

"Umi! Take your shoes off before you come inside the house!" Sorane yelled, stopping the excited Umi in her tracks. Umi did as she was told and put them by the door. "Goodness! You're thirteen years old! You should know better!"

Sorane's words struck a nerve in Umi's mind, and she was quick to glare back at her before shouting, "You're nineteen and you don't even drive!"

Unbeknownst to them, Hotaru was right in the dining room trying to work on her homework. But their yelling resounded all throughout the house. She couldn't even write down the answers to the math homework she just got. Sorane and Umi hurled words at each other back and forth.

"You have no manners at all, Umi!"

"All you ever do is complain!"

"Yeah, well, I don't leave my room a heaping mess all the time!"

"Be happy I actually appreciate what people do for me!"

Would it kill them to be quiet for just one minute? It didn't stop. Finally, Hotaru's built up anger exploded. She slammed her pencil on the dining room and let out an annoyed screech. It was so piercing it made the girls stop yelling and turn their heads around. They found an angry Hotaru, glaring at them, clenching her teeth.

Sorane froze upon seeing the seething anger in Hotaru's blue eyes. "What's...wrong?"

"What's wrong?! WHAT'S WRONG?!" Hotaru roared. Umi hid behind Sorane and covered her ears. Hotaru slammed her fist on the wall. "I thought it'd be great to have sisters, but...but you guys are TERRIBLE!"

The angry girl pointed at a surprised Sorane with her index finger. "You! All you ever do is complain and whine and act like you have to do every little thing around here! It's always woe is me with you! You're not the boss around here, y'know!" Hotaru then pointed at Umi. "You always make a huge mess out of everything, you're stubborn and always start fights! God! I can't stand either of you! Grow up already! Both of you!"

With that piece of rhetoric, Hotaru grabbed her phone and keys and slammed the door behind her, leaving Sorane and Umi behind. The younger girl stared down at her feet with a guilty, remorseful look. "We really did it this time, didn't we?"

The older girl facepalmed, wishing she hadn't scolded Umi earlier. "Can't we do anything right? Now Hotaru's mad because of us."

Speaking of Hotaru, she didn't go far. She just went to the park to sit on a bench and stretch her legs and arms out. She also groaned and pushed her hands through her hair. Already she regretted lashing out at them, and normally she always tried to handle situations in a calm manner. Perhaps being a Pretty Cure did a number on her.

When she was younger, she used to wonder why she didn't have a mother, and would often come home crying because kids picked on her for having two dads. Some kids even said her mother abandoned her. Hotaru had since come to terms with it, and moved on. At the same time, she wondered what having a brother or sister would be like. She imagined having someone she could talk to, tell secrets to, play games with, and ask advice.

This was nothing like she imagined.

Hotaru couldn't stand Sorane and Umi's constant quarrels. In her heart, she knew living with her was a big adjustment for them, too. It wasn't as though they'd get along like peaches and cream right off the bat. Hotaru definitely didn't hate them, and all she wanted was to help them out. They deserved better than a life on the streets. But their arguing was just too much!

The tired girl looked up at the blue sky above her, marveling at the wispy white clouds floating aimlessly, without a care in the world. A gentle breeze stroke her hair, lifting up just an inch. The chill in the air burned her skin somewhat. She silently chastised herself for not bringing a scarf with her. Being a Pretty Cure helped her endure worse than Sorane and Umi's quarreling, so she thought she could deal with it.

Back at the Minamigawa house, Umi dug through the closet so she could put some clothes away. Something rolled out from the closet and into her foot. It didn't hurt her, but Umi did feel it enough to notice. She looked down and saw that it was a tiny cylindrical toy that resembled a telescope. She picked it up and looked into it. She saw a multicolored picture of a sparkling nebula.

"Oooh! This must be one of those kaleidoscopes!" Umi mused, marveling at the pictures. She pressed a button, and the picture switched to a comet trailing through the sky, among other pictures.

It was here that Kyouichi came into the room. "Hey, Umi-chan. What'cha lookin' at?"

Umi showed him the telescope. Kyouichi gasped. "Wow! That's Hotaru's favorite kaleidoscope!"

"Really?"

"Yeah! She lost it back in elementary school. Where'd you find it?"

Umi pointed to the closet. "In there."

"Boy, is she going to be happy to hear this."

An idea hatched in Umi's head. "This is her favorite?"

Kyouichi told Umi about how she would sit in her room for hours staring into that thing to the point of forgetting to do her homework. He even told her about the time she lost it and was miserable about it for weeks on end. The more Umi heard the story, the brighter her demeanor became. She could give this to Hotaru to make up for making her angry! It's perfect!"

"I'm gonna go give this back to her now!" Umi swiped the telescope before dashing out of the room. She almost ran into Sorane, who was quick to back off.

"Umi?! Where are you going?!" Sorane was quick to give chase. Both she and Umi stormed out the front door in a matter of second, much to Sojiro's surprise.

"What's got them in a tizzy?" Sojiro asked.

"They found Hotaru's favorite kaleidoscope," Kyouichi answered, putting a hand on his hip.

Umi ran through the neighborhood with the telescope snugly in hand, looking for any sign of Hotaru, with a frantic Sorane close behind, not that she noticed. "Umi! Umi! Wait up!"

The excited girl finally stopped upon hearing Sorane's voice. "Sorane? You were following me?" Umi tilted her head to one side.

Sorane stopped to catch her breath. _'Seriously?! This whole time you've been running around and didn't even know I was right behind you?!'_ Sorane thought. She had to wonder if her sister had some kind of tunnel vision whenever she had something in her head. This happened a lot. When Umi wanted to do something, she'd rush to get it done no matter what. "Where are you going?"

"To find Hotaru-chan! Kyouichi-san said this is her favorite toy!" Umi waved the telescope around like it was a Miracle Light.

"Don't shake it so hard," Sorane advised.

Umi didn't even hear it. "If we find her and give this to her, she won't be mad at us anymore! It'll be perfect!"

Sorane smiled a bit, happy that her sister was so considerate and eager to make up for the mess they caused. "That's nice of you, but she might want to cool off, first. We don't wanna rush into things and make her even angrier."

Umi puffed her face out. She was never one to be patient. "But I want to do it now so I don't have to worry about it!"

Sorane put a hand on her little sister's shoulder. "I know. I get how you feel. But let's just-"

_BOOM!_

An explosion behind them almost sent them flying. Umi was quick to grab Sorane and make sure she didn't fall and hurt herself. Leaves, twigs, and smoke were flying everywhere. When Sorane regained her composure, she held Umi close to keep her from inhaling the smoke. What in the world just happened? Where did that explosion come from?

Before any of them could react, a dark figure suddenly let out a piercing scream before leaping on them. It was Hotaru who heard another scream. "What the-?!" She was quick to stand up and pull out her Heart Lighter. That was Umi's scream she heard.

Hotaru was quick to transform into Cure Starlight and rush to the horrible scene. An angry Zenjin was holding Umi in the air by the neck. She had her fingers digging into his arms, struggling to break free. "LET UMI GO!" With a mighty yell, Sorane ran right into Zenjin, sending him rolling on the grass. The force of the tackle was so strong he let go of Umi. But Zenjin shot a sphere of energy right at Sorane, sending her into the air. Cure Starlight caught her in the nick of time.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah! He just came out of nowhere and attacked us!"

"Why'd you do that?!" Umi yelled. Zenjin was panting like he ran a marathon, his eyes blazing with the kind of anger one would see in a serial killer.

"YOU ALL DESERVE TO DIIIIIE!" Zenjin roared before shooting balls of energy everywhere. Starlight managed to deflect them all with her naginata, giving Sorane and Umi time to transform into Cures Skylight and Sealight.

"Pretty Cure, let the light shine!"

"I am the light whose wings radiate the sky, Cure Skylight!"

"I am the light that sparkles on the ocean waves, Cure Sealight!"

When Zenjin stopped firing energy balls at them, Skylight and Sealight were quick to try and land some punches on him. He successfully blocked them both with both hands and threw them into the air with almost no effort. They descended back to the ground and charged at him again, swinging punches and kicks at him in a desperate attempt to land a hit on him. They couldn't land even one punch or kick. Zenjin was too fast for them. Skylight tried slapping him with her wing, but he backflipped twice before punching her so hard in the face she was sent flying.

"Sealight Aqua Ring!" Sealight made a huge ball of water appear, and it caught Skylight just in time. The injured area glowed in a soft blue light, alleviating the pain in Skylight's face.

"Starlight Shower!" A rain of stars came down on Zenjin, bombarding him. "Why did you attack them just now?" She demanded in a cold, stern voice.

Instead of answering coherently, Zenjin let out a roar resembling that of a wild animal and charged at her. This time, Starlight managed to block his attack and sweep him off his feet with a swift kick. A chill went down Cure Starlight's spine, even though she tried to keep herself calm. She was used to seeing Zenjin be volatile and out of control, but never to this extent.

"EVERYTHING IS YOUR FAULT! ALL YOUR FAULTS!" Zenjin fired another energy ball at Starlight, but she knocked it away with her fist.

"Emerald Tsunami!" A green torrent of water swamped Zenjin so fast he didn't have time to react.

"Feather Dance!" Once he was airborne, Skylight took the chance and trapped him in a floating veil of feathers, keeping him in mid-air. "Spill the beans, bucko! Why'd you ambush us just now?!"

"MY NAME'S NOT BUCKO! ITS ZENJIN! GET IT RIGHT YOU BRAIN DEAD TRASH!"

Sealight covered her ears. She had never seen someone so volatile and hysterical. Zenjin didn't stop ranting and raving. "YOU'RE ALL A BUNCH OF STUPID IDIOTS! NONE OF YOU DESERVE TO LIVE! YOU'RE EVERYTHING THAT'S WRONG IN MY LIFE! I WANNA RIP YOUR HEADS OFF AND GARGLE ON YOUR BLOOD AND KILL YOU SLOWLY AND PAINFULLYYYYY!"

"Oh my," Skylight could feel goosebumps forming on her arms. Sealight was quick to hide behind her. With another piercing roar, Zenjin broke through the feathers and lunged at the girls like a lion about to pounce on its prey.

"Go away!" Sealight unleashed yet another Emerald Tsunami, sending Zenjin far into the woods. The force was so strong that Zenjin could feel himself drowning. He snapped his fingers and teleported to save himself. But the bitter sting of Decebal's betrayal would never fade for as long as he lived.

The trio of sisters reverted back to normal. "Hotaru-chan! Are you okay?" Umi asked worriedly.

"I'm fine. Are you okay? Zenjin could have killed you there."

"We're okay. Thanks for saving us," Sorane said.

"Don't mention it," Hotaru looked down at the grass below her feet. "I'm...sorry for yelling at you earlier. I shouldn't have done that."

"It's fine. I need to work on not being so uptight all the time," Sorane agreed.

"We're sorry for making you mad," Umi said.

"It's okay. I'm not mad anymore."

"Oh! We brought this for you!" Umi dug through her pocket and pulled out the telescope. The moment Hotaru laid eyes on it, she almost tripped and fell on her rear. She had never seen anything so angelic.

"MY TELESCOPE!" Hotaru swiped it from Umi's hands and rubbed it against her cheek. "Oh my gosh! I've been looking for this thing for years now! Where'd you find it?!" Sorane and Umi turned to look at each other. They never knew Hotaru had such a side to her before.

"I found it in my closet," Umi replied tersely. Like a happy child reuniting with her mother, Hotaru leaped onto Umi and trapped her in a tight hug.

"Oh my gosh! You're awesome! Thank you sooooo much! You and Sorane are the best sisters I could ever ask for!" Hotaru cried, snuggling against Umi. The confused girl wrapped her arms around the excited Hotaru. Oh well. Might as well go with it.

"Sisterly group hug!" Sorane embraced both girls happily. She was sure life from here on was going to be splendid. Soon the girls broke out of the group hug.

"We better get home. Dad's probably making sukiyaki for dinner tonight," Hotaru mused, putting her telescope in her pocket.

Umi's eyes twinkled like the sun shining on the ocean. "I love sukiyaki! I'm starving! Race ya to the house, Neechan!" Umi immediately sprinted away.

"Umi! You get too excited!" Sorane gave chase, but with a smile on her face. A smiling Hotaru did the same. She smiled so much her face hurt, but she didn't care. Her stomach was begging for sukiyaki. She hoped Sojiro would make some of her favorite beef kushiyaki and gyoza, too.


	39. Meet Cure Sunlight!

Chapter 36: Meet Cure Sunlight! Who Had The Energia Before Zenjin?

Hikage had been out on Hikaribashi Middle School's blacktop for about an hour and a half now, doing nothing but shooting hoops. When he was younger, he would always go to the local basketball court in his neighborhood and practice, either by himself or with some friends. That hasn't changed, even now. Shooting hoops by himself always made him feel free. Free from homework, cleaning his forever messy room, his parents if they would argue, all those things. Sometimes he'd bring Riko with him when she wanted to get out of the house for a bit. Riko was never a fan of basketball, or sports in general, and he understood this. But sometimes getting out and playing something for a bit can get some stress off of one's shoulders.

Sweat trickled down his face as he bounced the basketball around, running toward the solitary basketball hoop like it was a mountain full of treasure. He leaped off the concrete ground for just a fleeting moment as the ball flew out of his hands. It rolled around the hoop for a bit before going through it, bouncing on the concrete.

Hikage wiped some sweat off his forehead before going over to pick the ball up. "Phew! That was a good workout," He said to himself, spinning the ball in between both hands. He sat down on the ground, pulled out a bottle of water, uncapped it, and gulped down a huge dose of fresh, cold water. He looked up at the changing sky, now a mixture of beautiful golden yellow, rosy pink, lavender purple, and ocean blue. He and Riko always liked to sit in the backyard deck and watch the sky change when the sun would set. The beautiful colors never ceased to be amazing and enchanting.

The entire blacktop was dark, encased in shadows. Hikage wondered if this was why he was named Hikage. Sun shadow. Or was it fire shadow? He figured he'd ask Saki or Arinao about it when he got home later today. But he definitely liked being in Hikaribashi. It's name meant "bridge of light," and it was certainly a nice place. Much nicer and more welcoming than Yokosuka.

Riko entered his mind, with her radiant smile and contagious charm to go with it. Hikage found himself smiling. Riko had become so much happier ever since they moved. For a moment, he had thought Riko had morphed into a completely different person. But no, this was what Riko had always been like: nice, kind, friendly, and sweet. Just squashed by all the negativity that surrounded her during their days at Yokosuka. Some days, she would spend entire days being nothing but sad, and that always broke Hikage's heart. But now? Riko was happier than he had ever seen her. She had friends. Real friends. She started going out more, doing new things, and actually being happy.

That was what made Hikage the happiest: seeing her smile, just like back when she was very little. It made his heart leap with joy to see Riko happy for the first time in what appeared to be years. Not only that, her friends were great people. He could tell they were the minute he laid eyes on them. And one of them was his own friend, Hotaru. In his heart, he thanked God for giving Riko what she always wanted and for making her happy.

"I think it's time I head back," Hikage said to himself before stretching his arms out, facing the sunset sky. But even though he was stretching, he could hear an odd buzzing sound. At first, he thought it was a bee. But the sound grew louder and louder the closer it came. The buzzing of a bee wasn't that loud. Soon, the ground was shaking. Hikage clung to the metal fence. An earthquake? No, earthquakes don't come with buzzing.

_Whoosh!_

A large black hummingbird with glowing, bloody red eyes zipped right across the school. He was quick to grab the chain link fence so he wouldn't get blown away. He had never seen a hummingbird of that size before. Was that one of the monsters everyone was talking about?

"Over there! I see it!"

Six girls suddenly bolted onto the scene, with the white one encasing herself in a white light shaped like a bird. "Skylight Phoenix!" Cure Skylight threw herself at the hummingbird multiple times. But it wasn't enough to make it go down.

"My turn! Dawn Sunny Whip!" Cure Dawn threw a long rope at the hummingbird, wrapping it up so much that it couldn't so much as open its wings. He fell right on its feet and tried to escape, but Cures Twilight and Starlight landed some kicks and punches on its body. Even the fairies got in on the battle and threw glowing energy balls at it to make sure it didn't do any damage.

"Careful! Don't damage the school!" Cure Starlight advised.

"We got this!" Sunbeam added before shooting an energy ball at the hummingbird's eye.

Sealight rose her hand into the air, and a green fishing rod appeared. She whipped it around a few times before wrapping it around the hummingbird. "Undersea Hook!" She pulled it up into the air and pummeled it down onto the street, leaving a huge pot hole in the middle of the road.

"Flame Fist Fury!" Cure Dusk leaped onto the hummingbird's head and pummeled it with a flurry of unending punches.

"Twilight Masquerade!" Cure Twilight decided to help out and bombarded it with multicolored bubbles.

Hikage couldn't believe his eyes. He was seeing a group of superheroes fighting a huge monster. He never thought he'd ever live to see something like this. But something about them looked familiar. Cures Twilight, Starlight, Dawn, and Dusk looked and sounded almost exactly like Riko, Hotaru, Anzu, and Marina. But that couldn't be true. There was just no way.

"Ready for the obligatory finishing move?" Skylight hollered.

"Ready! Bless us with your shine, holy light! Pretty Cure Shining Light!" The splendorous light was so brilliant that Hikage had to squeeze his eyes shut. The light stripped the hummingbird down into a glass orb.

Cure Skylight knelt down and picked it up, taking care not to drop it. "I'll go and give this back. You take care, okay?" Cure Skylight said. Everyone nodded before the winged girl ascended into the sky.

Hikage found himself awestruck. Boy, were they cool!

Riko was the first to revert back to normal. The first thing she did was stretch her arms out. "Another day, another soul purified! Boy, was that a good workout!"

Hikage's excitement faded as soon as he saw the de-transformation. No way. No no no no no. Cure Twilight was Riko?! Riko had been masquerading around as a superhero this whole time?!

She's been putting herself in danger?! For how long?! Hikage's mind was racing, the joy in his heart replaced with worry...and anger. Why did Riko never tell him any of this? When did she even do all of this? Marina, Anzu, and Hotaru turned back to normal as well, making Hikage's eyes widen further. They were involved, too?! Hikage's hand clutched the chain link fence so hard his knuckles began to turn white.

This couldn't be true. It just couldn't be. But he saw Cure Twilight turn into Riko. He couldn't deny the truth.

The girls were blissfully unaware of his presence. Hikage was too shocked to hide. Marina brushed some dirt off of her knees. "Jeez. Flying CSes sure are tough to beat. Glad we did it, though."

"I know! Being a superhero is fun!" Umi chirped, spinning around like a top with her arms akimbo.

"No. Being a superhero isn't fun and rainbows, Umi. If we're not careful, people could die. Too many people have died already," Hotaru told her calmly.

Anzu readjusted her ponytail to keep her scrunchie from falling out. "I'm starving. I think my dad's making curry rice tonight. Better run back home."

"I better get home, too," Riko added.

"Didn't your mom say she was making tonkatsu tonight?" Moonbeam asked.

Whoa! Those fairies can talk?!

Riko averted Moonbeam's gaze. "I don't really like it too much. But miso soup with tofu is good."

"Ugh! I hate miso soup with mussels!" Lovebeam complained, holding her long ears to her face. "How do you people eat those things?! They're so gross!"

Starbeam straightened out her bow before going on a mussel tangent. "Actually, mussels are a very rich source of a plethora of nutrients, such as selenium, vitamin B12, zinc, and folate. The homo sapiens have been consuming mussels for many millennia, and they can be smoked, boiled, steamed, roasted, barbecued, or fried in butter or vegetable oil-"

"EWWWW!" Lovebeam complained.

Marina facepalmed. All of a sudden, Moonbeam's bow clip began flashing. "Huh? What's this?" Moonbeam pulled out the ComLap and opened it. King Ghislain's face opened on the screen. "Ohh! King Ghislain!"

"Moonbeam? Is that you, dear? I haven't seen you in a long time," King Ghislain said.

"Oh! Hey look! Meet the Pretty Cure! These are Tasogare Riko, Minamigawa Hotaru, Chino Anzu, Sakibara Sorane, and Sakibara Umi!" Moonbeam exclaimed.

"Hi," Everyone said shyly in unison.

"It's a pleasure to meet you all. But more importantly, I have some great news," King Ghislain said.

"What's up?" Umi asked.

"I got a message from one of my friends. She found Nozawa Youko," King Ghislain told them.

"Who's Nozawa Youko?" Sorane asked.

"Ohhh! You're talking about Cure Sunlight, aren't you?! One of the cure girls who disappeared to Earth after her and Daylight's battle with someone?" Lovebeam added.

"Yes! I'd like you to come to Rozaniela so we can see her in person. I'd also like to meet you all in person. Is that alright?" King Ghislain asked.

"Yes! We'll definitely be there! Can we come right now?" Marina asked.

"I'm afraid my wife and I are in the middle of some important business right now, and we won't be able to get out until tomorrow," Ghislain explained. "How about this? Let's meet on Rozaniela tomorrow at noon, Earth time. Is that okay with you?"

"Sure! That'd be perfect!" Sunbeam chimed in.

Ghislain flashed a warm smile. "It's so nice to see you all. I'll be seeing you tomorrow," With that, the ComLap's screen turned to static.

"How about we meet in the park at 11:30 first thing tomorrow?" Anzu suggested. "We can bring Kyoya-kun with us, too."

"I have no objections," Marina added tersely.

Sorane twiddled her finger around a lock of her black hair, tilting her head to one side with a raised eyebrow. She had come back from putting the Soul Orb back into someone's body just now. "So...we're seriously going to a new world?"

"Yep! You'll love it!" Riko replied, flashing a sweet smile.

Umi jumped up once, arms akimbo. "Yaaaay! This is awesome! I can't wait!"

Hearing this made Hikage clutch the chain link fence even harder. He could feel a piece of metal digging into his palm, scratching his skin, but he barely even noticed. With that, the kids dispersed and went back home. Hikage just sat on the blacktop in utter disbelief for about half an hour before dragging himself back home.

The first thing he saw was Riko on the floor with Yumiko, playing tug of war with one of her toy ropes. "Riko. We need to talk," Hikage said in a dark tone of voice. Riko barely heard him.

Saki came into the room. "Hikage. After dinner, please do your homework. Okay?"

Hikage didn't even respond.

* * *

When Marina moseyed up to her house, she noticed another car in the driveway. A cobalt bluish grey BMW, sitting right behind her mother's car. Was someone here? Marina opened the door, took off her shoes, and slipped on some slippers. "Mom! I'm back!"

The first thing she heard was the sound of merry giggling. It came from the living room. Marina stepped inside to find her mother laughing alongside a young, lanky man with bushy light brown hair. The man was younger than her real father, and she had never seen him before. Hatoko opened her eyes and turned to find Marina at the doorstep. "Welcome back, Mari! You're right on time!"

"I see you're having fun."

The man turned to Hatoko. "Is she your daughter?"

"Yep!" Hatoko stood up and escorted the man to Marina. "Marina, this is the man I told you that I was seeing. Miyata Takashi. Takashi-san, this is my daughter Marina."

Takashi smiled and shook Marina's hand. His grip was firm but she noticed his hands were soft and warm. "It's so nice to meet you. Your mother's told me a lot about you, dear."

"So I hear."

"He's going to make us dinner tonight. Is that okay, Mari?"

Marina's eyes widened. "Really? Awesome!"

"Your mom tells me you love shrimp, so I thought I'd make some shrimp pasta."

Marina's eyes glimmered like the stars in the night sky. "No way! Sweetness!" She couldn't help but smile and jump up once. _'I like this guy!'_ She thought.

The orange haired girl would soon find herself liking Takashi even more. At dinner, Takashi was quick to engage in more conversation with her. "I hear you want to be a rock star when you grow up, Marina. Is that true?"

"Yeah. I want to have my own band, just like Blue Moon."

Takashi's eyes slammed open, and his joy bubbled over. "You like Blue Moon too?! So do I! I have all of their albums from when I was a teenager!"

"No way!" Marina was so excited she found herself talking with her mouth full. Nobody bothered to correct her though. "You do know they came back, right?"

"Yep! They were big back in my day, and maybe they'll be bigger now than they were back then!"

Marina, Hatoko, and Takashi even found themselves sitting down and watching a movie together. There was something about Takashi that really resonated with Marina. He had something that Shouji didn't. He was open, engaging, and wanted to understand her and know her. Shouji would often be so hooked to his job that he barely ever came home. Takashi was right up her alley. Even though they had just met, Marina wished Hatoko would marry him already.

* * *

The night had turned into a new day, and everyone was at the breakfast table. Rina sat on the floor with Reese laying contentedly on her lap, stroking her fur gently. But Hikage's breakfast had gone untouched. Arinao and Saki looked at each other with confused faces. "Hikage? What's wrong? Your breakfast is getting cold," Arinao asked.

Hikage said nothing.

"You can tell us. We won't get mad," Saki said softly.

Hikage glanced at Riko. "Why don't you ask _her_ about it?"

"Huh?"

"Hey, Mom! Dad! I'm gonna go and hang out with my friends. Is that okay?" Riko asked.

Saki smiled. "Sure, honey. Just don't stay out too-"

"Stay here!" Everyone turned their heads to the source of the outburst.

"Hi...kage?" That was all Riko could choke out.

"Hikage. This isn't like you. Aren't you happy Riko's going out to play with her friends?" Saki asked.

Riko had just gotten to the door before Hikage slammed his hands on the desk so hard his plate clattered, sending the food all over the table. "You are staying here today and that is final, young lady!" He yelled so loud Riko covered her ears. Rina and Reese bolted for the den.

Arinao got in front of Hikage. "Hikage. Whatever this is about, please don't-"

"She's gonna turn into that magic superhero girl and fight monsters and get herself killed! Isn't that right, Cure Twilight?!"

Riko froze. Cure Twilight? Magical superhero girl? Fight monsters? How did Hikage know all of this? There was no way he should know about any of that. Unless...oh no! He didn't! Riko kept her hands over her ears. She was too paralyzed to even turn the doorknob.

"What are you talking about?" Arinao donned a puzzled look. What was Hikage saying? This was ridiculous! It wasn't like him to yell at Riko of all people. He tried to reason with Hikage, but the boy suddenly stomped over to Riko and stood firmly in front of her, staring her down with a blazing glare.

Riko couldn't help but shrink. She had never seen Hikage this angry. "You've been lying to me this whole time, haven't you?! I saw you and the other kids fighting that giant hummingbird last night!"

He saw the battle? That explained it. Riko didn't know what to say. He was too loud, too angry.

"Hikage! Enough! Don't yell at your sister like that!" Arinao grabbed his arm and tried to pull him back, but the angry older brother just wasn't having it.

"How long have you been doing this?! Since last week?! Last month?! Since we moved here?! What in the world are you thinking, putting yourself in danger like that?!"

Now he was shrieking. Riko's ear drums rang.

"Why didn't you tell me any of this?!" Hikage demanded, voice high in a hysterical shriek. His wild expression didn't change, and he was trembling with panic and rage. He couldn't help but pour it all out.

Stop...

"WHAT ELSE HAVE YOU BEEN LYING ABOUT?!"

"STOP IIIIT!" Riko had to shriek louder than he, and that was exactly what she did. She even had the audacity to push Hikage away. His face was too close to hers, and her eardrums were ringing. Even Hikage found himself speechless. Tears had already creeped out from Riko's eyes. Without another word, she stormed out the door, leaving Hikage to get scolded by his parents.

She ran so fast she didn't even stop to see where she was going. All she wanted was to get away from the yelling. The truth. Hikage saw the fight! He saw her de-transform! How was she going to break it to him? "Hey! Riko! Wait up!" Anzu and Umi managed to grab her before she could go any further.

"Are you running a marathon or something? We're not in any-" Umi was about to make a joke until she saw Riko's puffy, tear stained face.

Even Anzu found this disconcerting. "What's wrong?"

Riko couldn't help it. "An-chan!" She leaped on Anzu and cried on her shoulder. Anzu said nothing. She just let Riko cry and wrapped her arms around her, stroking her back gently. Umi did the same.

"It's okay. It's okay," They both whispered gently. It took Riko a few minutes to calm down.

"Want to talk about it when we get to the park?" Umi asked.

Riko nodded and they walked to their destination. The trio were silent throughout the walk to the park. It was Kyoya who noticed Riko's odd demeanor. "What's wrong?"

Riko told them everything.

"Ehhhhh?! Hikage found out?!"

Riko gave a grim nod. "What do I do? Now he's mad. He's never yelled at me before," She wiped her tears off with her sleeve. "He probably won't listen to me if I explain it to him."

Hotaru flashed a smile and put a hand on Riko's shoulder. "It'll be alright. When we get back, we can think about what to do about it. Don't lose faith."

"So...we're going to this new planet, right?" Sorane asked.

"We'd better set out," Anzu said.

"How do we get there?" Umi asked curiously.

Lovebeam raised her hand. "We can help!" She and the other fairies recited the spell needed to go to Rozaniela. Off they went. The multicolored tunnel made them squeeze their eyes shut as it was too bright. But when they opened their eyes, a whole new world opened up before them.

"Woooow!" As soon as Sorane and Umi landed on Rozaniela, they couldn't help but be awestruck by this strange, alien world they were in.

Pink and purple skies with a shining white sun. Trees in all colors of the rainbow. Huge, colorful flowers springing up from the ground. Fairies of all shapes and sizes flying all over the place, people and beast men bustling about, and animals scuttling about, like birds, rabbits, squirrels, and even magical creatures like alicorns and hippocampi.

But the fairies and other kids noticed something else entirely. The planet looked a lot nicer and cleaner than the last time they came here. Structures such as houses and castles were now completely fixed, standing taller and stronger than ever. The people scurrying about didn't seem to be doing anything related to rescues or burials anymore. Little kids were playing their usual games, such as hopscotch, tag, hide and seek, kemari, truth or dare, etc. having fun and laughing merrily. New shoots were growing from the once desolate ground, with people watering them every chance they got.

"I always thought fantasy worlds were just that. Fantasy. How can any of this be real?! I know you guys told me about how it was created and all that stuff, but still!" Sorane exclaimed.

"This is awesome!" Umi couldn't believe her eyes. "Look at all this! The sky's all pink! Look! Those trees are purple! There's supposed to be no such thing as purple trees! Oh! Look! Look!" She pointed to the ocean and saw horses with fish tails. Their rainbow scales shimmered in the sunlight. "Hippocampi!"

They all ambled over to the Queen's castle. Sorane and Umi marveled at the new sights and smells before them. It took a short while, but they arrived at the Queen's castle, where they were greeted by the Queen herself and her husband, the King.

"Malgorzata!" The four fairies flew toward their beloved queen and hugged her warmly.

Malgorzata hugged them back. "It's so good to see you again," It was here that she saw some new faces in the group. "My oh my. It seems you have some new friends."

Riko was the first to introduce the girls to the Queen and her husband. "Yep! You know how you told us that two Heart Lighters went missing? Well, Umi-chan found them and as it turns out, Sorane-chan and Umi-chan are new Pretty Cure! This is Sakibara Sorane-san aka Cure Skylight, and her sister Umi-chan aka Cure Sealight."

"What the...she's a real queen?! What...oh my God! I'm not dressed in formal attire! I must look like a rummage sale reject! Whaddo I do?! Whaddo I doooo-" Sorane worried like a worrywart, but Malgorzata put a hand on her shoulder, which calmed her down.

"Don't worry, dear. I honestly don't care about how you dress. I think you look wonderful," Malgorzata said.

Sorane blushed and bowed before the Queen. "It's...an honor to meet you, Your Highness."

Umi was quick to raise her hand at the Queen, just like she would any other person."Hello! I'm Sakibara Umi! It's nice to meet you!"

"Umi! That's not the proper way to greet a Queen!" Sorane scolded but nobody cared.

"It's alright. Oh! I don't believe you've met my husband yet. Ghislain, I'd like you to meet the Pretty Cure, the warriors who will help stop Zenjin and save both Earth and Rozaniela from calamity. The boy is their friend Kyoya, and he's their friend. Girls, this is my husband, Ghislain," Malgorzata introduced her husband to everyone. Everyone curtsied to the king.

"I'm very happy to meet you all. I'm only sorry that children as young as you all are being forced into this mess in the first place," King Ghislain told them.

"It's okay. We're not just gonna sit around and let Zenjin do what he wants," Kyoya piped in.

"By the way, you said something about finding one of the Pretty Cure before us. Cure Sunlight, was it?" Hotaru asked.

"Yes. Nozawa Youko. Both she and Hinata left Rozaniela to defeat someone who had the Energia before us, and they haven't come back to Rozaniela. But one of my friends managed to track down Youko-san's current residence. She lives in Hokkaido, in a city called Obihiro," King Ghislain told them.

"So...you want us to meet her?" Anzu asked.

"Yes. But not alone. I'll be going with you. I haven't seen Youko-chan in years, and there's so much we need to catch up on," Malgorzata told her.

"But how are we gonna get there? It's too far away," Riko asked.

"Really far!" Umi added.

"Not to worry. Ghislain and I have the power to teleport anywhere we want if we know the specific place we want to go," Malgorzata said. "We may have sealed our powers in the Energia, but we managed to keep some for events such as this. My friend managed to write down Youko-chan's address and current residence."

Moonbeam's ears twitched. "Are we going now?"

"Yes! Is that alright?" Malgorzata replied.

"Sure. We don't mind at all. We'd love to meet a veteran Pretty Cure," Marina said.

"I have to stay here and look after things," Ghislain said.

"Let's join hands," Malgorzata extended her hands out. Everyone joined hands, the fairies included, and closed their eyes. _'Please. Take us to 61591 Misumi Avenue, Obihiro, Hokkaido, the residence of Nozawa Youko,'_ Malgorzata thought. Everyone became encased in a white light, and they all disappeared.

When everyone opened their eyes, they found themselves in front of a small white house. There were some potted plants on the porch, such as pansies and poppies. Malgorzata read the name plate on the wall: Nozawa. She silently knocked on the door.

"Coming!" An old woman's voice called out. Malgorzata walked some steps back, and an old woman opened the door. The woman looked to be almost eighty years old, complete with tightly done, snow white hair, and wrinkles all over her face. Her hazel eyes had lost their shine, and she was wearing traditional miko attire: a white shirt, a red hakama, and traditional Japanese geta sandals.

As soon as the old woman saw the Native American dressed woman, she gasped. A hand flew to her mouth and her hazel eyes widened. "Ma...Ma...Malgorzata…?"

Malgorzata smiled. "It's been so long, Youko."

"Oh my word…" Youko approached the silver haired woman to get a better look at her. "You haven't changed one bit…"

"You sure have. I've missed you," With some tears creeping out of her eyes, Youko trapped the immortal woman in a hug. Malgorzata wrapped her arms around the older woman. She really had changed over the years.

"Oh, Malgorzata...it's so good to see you after all these years…" Youko told her warmly before letting her go. Youko noticed the kids and fairies right then. "Oh! I see you brought some cute little guests. Come on inside!"

The inside of Youko's house wasn't anything to write home about. It was a cute little home with some simple furniture, pictures of watercolor flowers and birds on the wall, some flower arrangement displays, etc. Malgorzata noticed that Youko had many pictures on the walls, featuring Youko and Hinata. But she stopped when she noticed a small shrine in the den. There was a small picture of a twenty-year-old Hinata standing on it. In the picture, Hinata was smiling, showing off a new doll she fixed up. Malgorzata's smile immediately faded. Youko took notice, and her own smile faded too.

"I never knew...what happened to her…?" Malgorzata choked out.

"A car accident. Both her and Gideon. Her car went out of control and they went into a lake. They couldn't save her. She was thirty one," Youko explained as they sat down in the den.

She went into the kitchen to get a silver platter with some tea cups and a tea kettle on it. "So...you finally found me, huh?"

Some tears creeped out of Malgorzata's face. "I've missed you so much," Malgorzata sipped some tea. It had a nice, rosy scent and a sweet taste. "Tell me. How has Earth treated you?"

Youko stretched out one of her miko sleeves to get rid of some wrinkles. "At first, both Hinata and I had a very hard time adjusting. Kids didn't like us for not following their norms, such as wearing make up, not knowing Japanese manners, not being able to use their technology, etc. But we managed to graduate high school, go to college, and get jobs. I've been a shrine maiden since I was twenty. I enjoy the work. It's peaceful and quiet, except during New Year's, of course. Hinata worked in a toy store and sold her own dolls there. She and I lived together the entire time. We had a hard time figuring out mortgage, how to buy houses, how to pay bills, all of those things. Gideon helped us, but it was still hard."

"I see," Malgorzata said. "I'm glad you're alright."

"Me too."

"Umm...there are some people I'd like you to meet. These girls here are new Pretty Cure."

Youko's eyes widened again. "What? New Pretty Cure?"

"Yes. Riko here is Cure Twilight. Anzu is Cure Dawn, Hotaru is Cure Starlight, Marina is Cure Dusk, Umi is Cure Sealight, and Sorane is Cure Skylight. The boy here is their friend Kyoya," Malgorzata explained.

"Hello!" Umi bowed before Youko. Everyone else did the same.

"My word..." Not once did Youko ever think that the events from her youth would repeat themselves. And they looked so young! Well, Hotaru and Sorane were older than them, but it didn't mean she wasn't worried about them just the same. "It's nice to meet you all. But what happened?"

Malgorzata set down her tea cup. "A child we adopted got his hands on the Energia and has been causing trouble. Many civilians have died because of his mischief. But we don't know his motive for stealing the Energia. Since you dealt with someone who had it before, we were wondering if maybe you could tell us about the person who got his hands on the Energia."

"I see…alright then," Youko said. But before she told her story, she noticed the fairies. "Aren't you cute."

"Hi! I'm Sunbeam! And these are my sisters Lovebeam, Moonbeam, and Starbeam!" Sunbeam chirped.

Youko flashed a smile and clasped her hands together. "My goodness! You must be Hornbeam and Crossbeam's children, aren't you?"

Moonbeam's ears twitched and her eyes widened, twinkling with curiosity. She couldn't help but yelp, "What?! You knew our parents?!"

"Yes! Crossbeam was one of my dearest friends. She was such a little angel. But Hornbeam...he and Hinata argued like cats and dogs over the silliest things!" Youko told them with a laugh.

"Wait a minute! If your parents knew Cures Sunlight and Daylight...then...exactly how old are you?" Umi asked.

"I've been wondering about that, myself," Riko added.

"You see, girls, we Rozanielan fairies age much slower than humans. For example, I happen to be exactly 22 years old, which to us fairies is twelve years old. It's like how cats being five years old are actually forty years old, but it's the opposite for us fairies," Starbeam explained.

"I'm twenty-four, which makes me fourteen in human years!" Lovebeam exclaimed.

"I'm twenty one, and that makes me...eleven, sorta," Sunbeam said.

"I'm nineteen, which makes me nine in human years," Moonbeam said.

Riko stared at the tatami mats below her feet. She really didn't like how scratchy they felt. Then again, she was never a fan of tatami mats at all. "That makes absolutely no sense to me."

"True that," Kyoya added.

"That means you get to stay children longer than we do! Boo!" Anzu stuck out her lips.

"Alright already! Just tell us the story about this crazy dude who had the Energia before us!" Marina exclaimed.

"The news reports back then said that large, black animals roamed various German cities," Youko began. "As we learned later, these black animals were people's souls, only corrupted. After a while, we managed to encounter a man who went under the alias Volund. He donned a cape and acted like he was a hero, claiming to be saving people from negative feelings and bad thoughts. We confronted him and he revealed himself to be Wetzel Strobel.

"He wasn't a bad person. He was actually a very shy, gentle little man, but from what we heard, people were quite cruel to him. He had good intentions at first, but he got too caught up in his powers, and it all went to his head after a while. He started going after people who were cruel to him. We tried to convince him that his actions aren't the right course of action, but he wouldn't listen at first. We purified the monsters first. Some people we saved, some we couldn't," Youko donned a sad look when she said that last part.

A memory flashed through Youko's mind. She and a wailing Cure Daylight were standing before the corpse of a man whose Soul Orb had been destroyed despite their efforts to save him. Youko shook her head to force the memory out and continued. "After a while, he thought we were sent to kill him, and fought us with everything he had. Hinata and I tried to fight him, but he was too strong. Finally, we managed to get the upper hand and take the Energia out of him. It was after this that he finally realized what he had done. We didn't think he'd be so remorseful, but he was. He cried and wished he had never found that jewel. He even thought about taking his own life to atone, but we talked him out of it. He gave it back willingly and that's when Hinata and I decided to stay on Earth with Gideon."

Marina made a face. "Sorry, but the guy we're dealing with is nothing like that Wetzel guy. Zenjin's a crazy kid who kills people and wrecks everything just for kicks and giggles and doesn't care about the carnage he causes. He doesn't give a rat's hat about anyone but himself!" The memory of Zenjin rummaging through her Soul Portal was strong in her mind.

"Considering what happened to him when he was young, I'm not surprised he turned out the way he did," Starbeam added. "Anyone can become a cruel person if they're exposed to enough hatred, and sometimes children imitate the things their parents do just to see what it's like."

'_Reminds me of that time I got into my mom's makeup and made myself look like I came out of a dumpster,'_ Marina thought. An image of a four-year-old Marina flashed through her mind, her clothes and visible skin covered with streaks of dark red lipstick, too much eye shadow, and many other makeup products she got into. Marina shrugged upon remembering the time her mother cleaned her up while scolding her at the same time, saying something about how expensive most of it was and how she shouldn't have gone through her mother's things.

"Thank you for taking time to talk to us," Malgorzata said. "I only wish...you had contacted me in all those years we missed."

"I know," Youko said. "But we had no way to do so. Crossbeam and Hornbeam moved on, and we didn't want to get in their way. Plus, I'm quite happy here. I got to face some trials and overcome them. I've become a better person for it," Youko added.

"Now that we know his name, I'll have some of my friends track him down. If we find him, we might be able to figure out what we need to do in order to defeat Zenjin," Malgorzata said.

"One question. How did you even get the Energia out of him?" Anzu asked.

Youko looked up at the ceiling lamp and ruminated. "Hmmm...now that you mention it, I don't really remember how we did it. I think we punched it out of him, but my memory's been fuzzy as of late," Youko told her.

Malgorzata turned to the kids. "Kids? Would it be okay if you stepped out for a bit? Youko and I have some things we need to discuss in private," Malgorzata said.

Sorane wasted no time herding the kids out of the room, leaving Malgorzata and Youko alone. "So...we came all the way here just to hear some guy's name?" Marina asked with her arms crossed.

"It's not a total waste. If Malgorzata tracks down Wetzel, we may learn more about the Energia," Starbeam said.

"But none of this is gonna make defeating Zenjin easier, now is it?" Marina asked.

"That's true. There's still so much we don't know," Moonbeam chimed in.

"Well, Youko-san seems nice. I liked hearing her story. But I would have liked to meet Hinata-san, too," Riko piped in.

"Me too. She seemed like a nice person," Umi agreed.

"It's better than nothing, right? But I wonder what they looked like when they were Pretty Cures?" Kyoya said.

"They don't have any pictures of them as Cures. I asked about that, but they didn't have cameras back then," Sunbeam said.

The kids sat outside Youko's house to hang around for a while. Soon, Malgorzata came out with Youko behind her. Youko had a smile on her face. "It's so nice to meet you kids. I'd love to chat with you, but I have to go to work in a few minutes," Youko said.

"No problem. We have to get going anyway. Thanks for having us," Hotaru replied.

"You're welcome. But…" Youko donned a serious look. "There's something I want to tell you all."

Everyone stopped to listen.

"Hinata and I had some hard times after we came to Earth. When Hinata died, I didn't think I could go on. There was just too much I couldn't handle. I even thought about killing myself once. But then I realized that Hinata would have wanted me to live on. So I did. Children...I can tell you have all been through considerable hardship. I won't ask what you went through, but I want to tell you this: no matter what happens, don't give up on life, and don't forget about the good the world has to offer. I've seen too many people succumb to their sadness because they thought there was no hope for them. But don't ever give up, even when it seems like the whole world is against you. Life can be cruel, but that doesn't mean it isn't worth living. We grow by overcoming hardship. I know I have, and I couldn't be happier. There's always a light shining in the darkness, no matter how small it is. Now go and protect all that you love," Youko told them.

Everyone nodded silently. Malgorzata took them all back to Rozaniela. Youko got in her car and drove away. But she found herself lost in some memories.

(flashback)

_In a large, empty soccer field, a blonde girl of about sixteen was crying into her hands. A red haired girl with pigtails is sitting next to her, rubbing her back gently. Both of them were wearing school uniforms consisting of dark blue blazers, white shirts, green bow ties, long gray skirts, white socks, and brown shoes._

"_I can't do this! I just can't! I wish I was back in Rozaniela! At least there, everyone was nice to each other and didn't care about stupid stuff like manners and cliques and hair colors!" Youko cried into her hands passionately._

"_Seriously, this is our natural hair color! We didn't dye it!" Hinata yelled as she stood up and kicked a rock onto the grass before slumping back down. "You're right. People here overreact too much. What's wrong with having different colored hair? I don't see anything wrong with it."_

_Youko continued to cry. But a courageous glint appeared in Hinata's eyes. "We'll show them! So what if we're different from them? We'll just have to keep our heads high and march forward!" Hinata shouted as she pumped a fist in the air._

"_Easy for you to say," Youko sniffed. Her eyes were heavy from too much crying. "Why are you always so positive about everything? It's hopeless! They hate us just because we're different from them and know nothing about this country's rules and norms!"_

"_Who cares about rules and norms? I sure don't! It's not like the world's gonna end because new stuff is happening. Also...I don't want to spend my life being sad and feeling like I can't fit in," Hinata brushed one of her pigtails out of her face. "If we can't fit in, then we can't. Who cares? All I care about is living my life and enjoying it! It's like Gideon says!" The pig tailed girl punched the air. We should live every day like its our last!"_

_Youko stopped crying. She made some very valid points. She wiped her eyes with her sleeves, but they were still red and swollen from too much crying. "Earth is just too different from Rozaniela. Now I see why Malgorzata didn't want us to stay here. People here are just too strict about everything, and act like the littlest thing different is the worst thing in the world."_

"_You're telling me. We came here to live our own lives, not worry about fitting in with people and their weird rules. If I wanna play in the dirt and run around barefoot, then I'm gonna play in the dirt and run around barefoot!" Hinata shouted._

_Youko burst into laughter at that last sentence. Then she calmed down. "You're right. Being ourselves is what we're good at."_

"_Duh! We should celebrate being different! Isn't that what Malgorzata always taught us?"_

_Youko nodded._

(end flashback)

Youko looked at a picture of herself and Hinata, but as Cures Sunlight and Daylight, flashing peace signs and smiling happily. More voices echoed through her mind.

"_We can get through this! I know it, Sunlight! We've gotten through all the other bad stuff in our life, so we can get through this too!"_

"_You're right, Daylight. If we work together, we can make it through anything the world will throw at us! We can defeat Volund once and for all!"_

Youko smiled. "Hinata…even in Heaven, you're still encouraging me to go on."

* * *

On the way home, Hotaru leaned over to Riko with a sympathetic expression. "I take it you're worried about your brother, aren't you?"

Riko nodded. Although Riko was happy to have met Youko, the memory of Hikage's outburst was strong in her mind. What would Riko do when she got home? How could she explain it to him? Where would she even start? Riko squeezed her eyes shut ruefully. She wished Hikage hadn't found out.

She felt a gentle hand latch onto her shoulder. Riko looked up to find Hotaru looking down at her with the same kind face. "Where's your brother right now?"

Riko looked up at the sky and ruminated. It was noon right now, right? Usually, on days like today, Hikage would go to the middle school's blacktop and practice basketball. He had made it a point to go there ever since they moved here. He had to be there now. Riko spilled the beans. But why would Hotaru ask about that?

"I'll go talk to him about it," Hotaru told her.

"Huh?" Riko found herself flummoxed. "But Niichan's sure to be mad! He'll yell at you, too!"

"That's not what I'm worried about. But I'll deal with him. You go back home, Riko. Okay?"

Riko wasn't sure if she should let Hotaru do this. However, Hotaru was always the kind of girl who wanted to mediate problems between friends. Riko nodded and went back home. She hoped Hikage wouldn't yell at Hotaru.

* * *

"Ugh!" Hikage was at the blacktop like Riko thought, but instead of throwing the basketball at the hoop, he just kept chucking it at the chain link fence. It always rattled and made clangy noises whenever the ball bounced off of it. Hikage had thrown the ball at the fence almost a hundred times, but none of it did anything to alleviate his anger.

It just kept bubbling up and pouring out. Hikage was too angry.

Scratch that, he was worried.

He couldn't believe this to be true! Riko turns into a magical girl hero and fights giant monsters, who could potentially kill her? And has been doing it for months on end? Hikage never knew about this. None of this. Why had Riko been hiding it all this time? Hikage picked the ball up and chucked it at the fence once more with another growl. His face was drowning in sweat.

Finally, he fell on the concrete and gasped for air. His arms felt like lumpy plum pudding, and his glasses fogged up. His hands rubbed against the concrete, and he could feel tiny pebbles and gravel digging into his palms, not that he cared. He just couldn't picture Riko fighting giant monsters with magical powers. Why? Why Riko? Whoever picked her to be some magical girl must be insane.

He had to protect Riko. He always had. From the time she was born, he was always there for her. He was there when Riko said her first words. When Riko was having early intervention sessions. When she cried about being bullied by that teacher. He was there to drive away the bullies when they were being mean to her. He was there when Rina would give her a hard time. He was there when she finally found a group of friends she could call her own.

She could die if she kept this up...and that was what Hikage feared most of all. He couldn't bear losing his sister. His family. Not after everything they went through.

It didn't help that he was out of line the last time he saw her. Why did he have to yell at her? Riko didn't deserve that. He knew she hated yelling, as it always made her cry, but he still did it. How could he be so insensitive? Hikage slapped himself in the face once as punishment, though he wished it was hard enough to make his nose bleed.

"Hey."

Hikage looked up to find Hotaru moseying into the blacktop. Hotaru...she was a Cure too, wasn't she? Hikage gave her a cold, steely glare. Hotaru's face didn't even twitch, like she expected this. Hikage stood up, stomped over to Hotaru and almost grabbed her shirt had she not stepped back.

"Did you rope Riko into this?!"

"Into...what?"

"The whole magical superhero thing! I saw you and the others fighting that giant hummingbird last night! You've been lying to me this entire time!"

Hotaru put a hand on Hikage's shoulder and pushed him back. "You're right. We have been lying to you, and I'm sorry. What you saw was real. The girls and I...we have been chosen to become superheroes. Pretty Cure," Hikage could hear her voice quiver despite Hotaru's attempts to remain calm and composed. "I didn't rope her into anything. I became a Cure after she did."

"Pretty Cure...is that what you're called," It didn't come out as a question. Hotaru could hear the anger seeping in his voice. She had to admit, she was shocked. Hikage never displayed any anger around her before.

Hotaru noticed the basketball near the fence, moseyed over to it, and picked it up. "Want to shoot some hoops?"

Hikage narrowed his eyes. What the heck? They talk about Pretty Cure stuff, and suddenly Hotaru wants to shoot some hoops? As much as Hikage wanted to interrogate her about Riko, he was never one to pass up a good game. Hotaru began bouncing the ball, running toward the hoop. But Hikage dashed forward, grabbing the ball and throwing it at the hoop. It rolled around twice before falling through the net.

"You're good," Hotaru mused.

Hikage wiped some sweat off his face. "You ever played before?"

"I tried once, when I was younger. I wasn't very good," Hotaru let out a merry laugh. "As you can tell, I'm still an amateur."

"It takes practice," Hikage moseyed over to the ball, picked it up, and threw it back through the hoop another time. "I didn't start out perfect, y'know."

A small chuckle suddenly creeped out of Hikage's mouth. But it wasn't a happy chuckle. Hotaru knew that much. "...Riko and I used to play in the park back at Yokosuka. She sucks at basketball. She still does. But one day she and I stayed in that park throwing that big ball around for five hours straight. She kept throwing it at the fence like she wanted to hit somebody with it," Hikage clutched the ball in his hands. He wanted so badly to pop it. Make it explode. Do something with it that'll take his anger away. "She didn't mind being so bad at it, though. She liked throwing that thing around with me."

He threw the ball at Hotaru. This time, she grabbed it. He didn't even try to intercept her this time. She threw the ball at the hoop, hoping it would go through the net. Alas, it bounced off the hoop and onto the blacktop. "Doh. Missed," She went to pick it up. "You two must be close. She talks about you a lot."

"I bet she does," Hotaru threw the ball back at Hikage. The bespectacled boy snorted in amusement and threw it back at her. Hotaru threw it back, but even though he caught it, he didn't throw it back at her. The features on his face turned sad. Hotaru could see the regret in his blue eyes.

"I don't get it."

"Get what?"

"Why did it have to be...you guys?"

Hotaru pulled out her Heart Lighter and showed it to Hikage. "These are called Heart Lighters. They're basically what we use to transform. They do have some sentience, and someone said they chose us because we happened to meet their criteria. We went through some hardship, and we had a desire to live and protect the people we love," Hotaru explained, her voice soft and kind. "It just...sort of happened."

"But...you fight those monsters, don't you? Aren't you scared you might get..." Hikage clutched the ball tighter. "...Killed?"

"Of course we are. But we've managed to come this far on our own. There's still so much we need to do," Hotaru put her Heart Lighter back in her pocket. "I know it's hard to hear. I get it."

"No," Hikage's voice turned hard. "No. You _don't_ get it," He narrowed his eyes at her, donning a steely glare. "You have no idea what Riko's been through! I've seen her come home from school bawling her eyes out because a teacher abused her! I've seen kids bully her mercilessly because she wasn't like them! My grandmother's sister doesn't even want to look at her because she's not her image of a perfect grandniece and can't let go of tradition!" His voice grew louder. "Almost every day she's had to see threatening glances, vicious writing on her desk, her stuff getting stolen or messed up, or insults from classmates her own age! She didn't deserve any of that! Was what they did in any way her fault?! No! No it wasn't! Nobody gets that! It was all Riko's bad this, Riko's bad that with them! They were jerks! Heartless jerks who only cared about themselves!"

Now it was Hotaru's turn to narrow her eyes at Hikage. She knew about all of what Hikage told her. Riko shared those secrets with her. "And now somebody wants her to kill herself for world peace?! Why?! It's too dangerous! She can't handle any of that!"

"What makes you say that?"

"Huh?" Hikage dropped the ball.

"You haven't seen what I saw," Hotaru picked the ball up and threw it at the hoop. Once again, it bounced off. "Riko's done so much for us as both a person and as a Pretty Cure. She could have rejected the offer to become a Cure, but she didn't. You have no idea what she's been through since last April. I've seen her almost beat someone to death because they tried to kill Kyoya-kun. I've seen her be put under a spell that almost killed her. She's put her life on the line multiple times for our sake...and for you and your family. You say she can't handle it...but she has."

Hikage balled his fists. He had no idea any of that happened. Had he known, he'd have wanted all the more to keep Riko out of this mess! And Kyoya was involved, too? "The only reason we never said anything about it to anyone was because we didn't want you to worry. We didn't want to put you in any danger."

"How can I NOT worry?! She's my sister! You expect me to be happy with her throwing her life on the line multiple times?!" Hikage roared. "It's my job to protect her! She's been through enough! She can't do this!"

Hotaru ambled over to Hikage, staring right into his eyes. She stared so hard she rendered him speechless. "Riko told me something once. I asked her why she wanted to become a Pretty Cure."

_"Riko? Can I ask you something?"_

_"What is it?"_

_"How come...you became a Pretty Cure?"_

_"I...At first I didn't know. All I wanted to do was help Mari-chan and stop Zenjin. But...y'know, I used to hate the world and people around me. People hated me, so I decided to hate them back. Being nice didn't help. I didn't think anyone would ever like me. I even thought everyone...would be better off if I didn't exist. But ever since I came here...I found friends. Real friends. People who liked me for me and didn't mind if I was kinda weird. I've been so much happier here than I ever was back at Yokosuka. Now, I don't hate the world anymore. I want to protect my friends and family now. That's why I want to help Rozaniela and be Cure Twilight. I want to spend my whole life in Hikaribashi, with my friends and family, and I don't want some crazy kid to ruin it for me or for everyone else. I know I get scared during the battles and all, but...I want to be brave. You've all done so much for me. My family protected me all this time. Now, it's my turn to protect them."_

"She...said that?"

Hotaru nodded.

"My God..."

"It's okay that you worry about her. Even I worry about her. That's another reason why I became a Pretty Cure, too. I wanted to help her out a little. She's been a great friend to me, Anzu, Kyoya, Marina, the fairies, and everyone else," Hotaru put her hand in his. "But you can't protect her forever. She knows that, now. She wants to be a hero and help other people, because she's happy now. It's thanks to you that she's come this far."

Hikage noticed his eyesight was blurring. His cheeks were wet. Was he crying? "Aw man...thanks, Hotaru. You're an awesome friend."

"You too."

"Sorry I snapped at you earlier."

"It's okay. I figured you'd do that."

Hikage slumped on the concrete. "Speaking of which...I really screwed up with Riko earlier. I yelled at her even though I knew doing so makes her cry!" He buried his face in his hands. "I'm a colossal idiot! I've never yelled at her before! I can't believe I did that!"

Hotaru sat down next to him and rubbed his back. "It'll be fine. You both have a lot to deal with. Just take all the time you need to cool off, then you can apologize. I'm sure she'll forgive you."

All Hikage could do was smile.

What neither of them knew was that Zenjin was standing in a big tree overlooking the blacktop, giving them a very curious stare. He crossed his arms, flashing a smirk that would only be present on someone who wanted to kidnap a little kid.


	40. Bonus 4: Riko's Birthday!

Riko Chapter 2: Riko's Most Wonderful Birthday!

(This takes place between chapters 34 and 37)

Tasogare Riko. Hair: black. Eyes: dark green. Age: 12, soon to be 13. Homeroom: F9. Teacher: Omori Seiko. Grade: 7th. Birthday: Unknown.

The day all the kids got back to school, Kyoya couldn't help but ask. "Hey Riko."

"Yeah?" Riko asked as she worked on a cute little manga strip featuring little chibi animals.

"When's your birthday?"

"January 15th."

"Today's January 2nd!" Kyoya exclaimed. That told him one thing: he has exactly thirteen days to get Riko a present!

Kyoya was dying to tell everyone about it. He couldn't tell them about it during recess because Riko would find out. The lessons seemed to drag on forever. Teachers talked, kids listened quietly, the lessons were boring like usual, Kyoya wanted to scream. Finally, the final bell rang, and once Saki picked Riko up and drove away, Kyoya met with Anzu, Marina, Chinami, Fukiko, and Hiroto after school to tell them about what he found out.

"Oh! Riko's birthday is soon? How come you never told us?" Chinami asked enthusiastically, her chocolate brown eyes sparkling with delight.

"I didn't find out about it until earlier today, and I have something I wanted to discuss with you all but I didn't want her to find out," Kyoya said.

Anzu crossed her arms. "A birthday party?"

Kyoya did a double take. "Jeez! How'd you know?"

"Just a guess," Anzu deadpanned.

"Oh! We should definitely throw her a big birthday bash! She hasn't had much friends before coming here, right?" Marina exclaimed with her hand in the air like she wanted to answer a teacher's question. "She probably hasn't had a birthday party before either. Let's make this extra extra extra special so she'll remember it forever and ever!"

"I agree! I actually have some stuff leftover from my last birthday party! I can bring it over and set it up!" Chinami yelped cheerfully.

"My mom always orders custom cakes at Shop-Rite whenever there's a birthday. I can ask her if maybe we can get a cake custom ordered for Riko," Fukiko added.

"I know she loves chocolate cake, that's for sure," Anzu added. Fukiko pulled out a pencil and a little notebook and wrote that down.

"And we definitely know her favorite colors are purple, pink, and white," Marina said. Fukiko wrote that down, too.

"And she loves cats," Kyoya added. Fukiko wrote that down as well.

"We'll stop by later to ask her brother for ideas on presents," Marina said.

"I already know what I'm getting her," Anzu added.

"Let's text each other so we can plan things out accordingly. Okay?" Kyoya asked. Everyone nodded before heading home. Once Kyoya got home, he told his mother all about his plans.

"Awww! How sweet of you, Kyo-chan! I'm sure Riko-chan will be thrilled! Do you know what present you want to give her?" Kayoko crooned sweetly, delighted with the fact that her son wants to make his friend happy.

"Not yet. I'll figure it out," Kyoya said before very slowly walking up the stairs. Once he got in his room, he sat on his bed and tried to think of a good present he could get for Riko. Lovebeam sat in her favorite corner, sewing.

"What's up, Kyo-chan?" Lovebeam asked. "You look like you're thinking about something."

"I am. Riko's birthday is coming up, and I'm trying to think of a good present I can get her," Kyoya said.

"Riko's birthday?! Awesome!" Lovebeam chirped. "I know she loves purple and cats! Oh! I should make something right now! This'll be perfect!" Lovebeam pushed her project to the side, pulled out some purple and grey fabric, and immediately began sewing. "Do you know what else she likes?"

"Well…" Kyoya counted them on his hand. "Purple, cats...she likes anime and manga, Pokemon games...I'd like to get her something related to Hinata Sun Child, but she has all the books and there isn't much in the way of merchandise for that," Kyoya said.

"I'm sure you'll think of something," Lovebeam chirped as she worked on her new project.

Kyoya looked around his room for some ideas. There has to be something he can get for Riko, something that'll truly convince her that he cares about her from the bottom of his heart. Then he looked at his books and noted his newly bought Moomin books. Yes, he bought his own copies. Then he remembered Riko's chocolate milk covered Moomin doll.

"_Why's your Moomin doll's nose all brown?"_

"_UUUGH! Don't get me started! Two years ago while I was at a therapy session STUPID Rina spilled chocolate milk all over it! She wanted to play tea party with it and I TOLD her not to touch my dolls! But did she listen?! Nooooo! Ugh, I was so mad I even hit her! We both got yelled at for it but Rina shouldn't have touched my doll! Now it's ruined forever, and there's no way to get the stuff off! I know we're on better terms now, but I still can't forgive her for messing it up. Do you know how hard Moomin dolls are to find these days? You can only find them online now."_

That's when it hit him. Kyoya sat up so fast that he could have been mistaken for a Jack-in-a-box. "A new Moomin doll!"

"Wah?!" Lovebeam yelped with surprise, as Kyoya's sudden declaration frightened her quite a bit. Kyoya tried to run, but his leg gave out and he fell on the floor. Lovebeam grimaced as soon as the thud infiltrated her ears.

"I'm good!" Kyoya said as he got back up and very slowly walked down the stairs as carefully as possible. He found Kayoko on her computer. "Mom! I know what I wanna get for Riko!"

"Is that so?" Kayoko said as she got off her computer so Kyoya can get on it. He pulled up the website called Ebait and typed in Moomin dolls. Lo and behold, there's lots of Moomin dolls up for sale. But most of them are pretty expensive, and not very accurate either. Kyoya kept on scrolling. Finally, he found a set of two dolls-Moomin and Floren-both stylistically accurate and cheap. "Mom. Can we order this?"

"Hold your horses, Kyoya. Let's check this seller's feedback first. We don't want to get ripped off by some skeevy person," Kayoko said as she checked the seller's feedback. Much to her surprise, the seller's feedback is 100%, and all of the reviews on the page are unanimously positive. "Alright. I suppose I can get this."

"Yay! You're the best, Mom!" Kyoya glomped his mother and wrapped his arms around her. Soon, she went through the process of ordering the dolls. Finally, Kayoko hit the _'Place Order'_ button, and it confirmed that the dolls have been purchased. "They should arrive soon, sweetie."

Kyoya knew _'soon'_ was going to be a while, so he needed something to take up his time. But the next day, Kyoya, Anzu, Marina, Chinami, and Fukiko went to Riko's house. Saki and Hikage answered the door. The kids told them everything. "Would it be okay if we did this? Please?" Chinami asked.

"Sure! No problem! I'm off that day. Riko will be so happy!" Saki told her sweetly.

"I can fill you in on some stuff that Riko likes," Hikage said.

Once they got permission, the kids dispersed. Fukiko asked her mother if they could order a custom made chocolate cake with lots of pink and purple flower frosting on it. Fukiko was convinced her mother would say no, but much to her surprise, she said yes! Cake: check. Chinami checked her house for leftover streamers and other party items. She found them. Party items: check. Later on, they all went out and bought whatever they thought Riko would like. Presents: check, except Kyoya's, which hasn't arrived yet.

Even the fairies got in on it. When Saki and Arinao were out of the house, Sunbeam decided to cook some of Riko's favorite food. She had gotten much better at cooking Earth food since she came to Earth. Instead of going out to buy presents, Moonbeam and Starbeam decided to make some with Lovebeam's help. Food: check.

"I wonder if Riko's ever had a birthday party before," Moonbeam said.

"No. Last I checked, she's never had one," Lovebeam added as she put some finishing touches on her present.

"She did say she had little to no friends back in her old home," Sunbeam said.

"Let's make this the best birthday party ever!" Moonbeam chirped. Everyone nodded in agreement. Caroline came into the room right then and there. "Hi, Caroline!" Moonbeam said. Caroline sat down next to Moonbeam and snuggled next to her. "Do you wanna help us with the party preparations?"

Caroline simply purred. Moonbeam smiled. "Okay then. Riko'll be happy just having you around."

Caroline stretched out her front paws in agreement.

"I'm afraid I'm not in the least bit capable of traditional housework such as sewing or knitting," Starbeam mused as she put down some books.

"That's okay. There's nothing wrong with that," Sunbeam said.

The only problem with all of this was that they had to make sure Riko didn't know about any of this. Riko occasionally saw the kids hiding stuff and acting like they weren't. She didn't question it, thinking that they were dealing with their own personal business.

Suddenly, the day before her birthday, a package arrived at the Mitomo house. Kayoko and Kyoya wasted no time opening it, and what did they find? The Moomin dolls! "They came!" Kyoya exclaimed as he pulled them out. Their fur is soft, and he couldn't find any rips, tears, or dirt marks on it. They're perfectly clean, and in tip-top condition.

"I'll put them in the gift bag I just bought. Is that okay?" Kayoko said. Kyoya nodded and put the dolls in a pretty purple gift bag with lots of pink and red flowers on it. When she left, Lovebeam finished her present and snuck it inside.

"This'll be great!" Lovebeam said.

"It sure will!" Kyoya said.

Finally, January 15th arrived. Since it was the weekend, the kids decided to arrive at about 10:00 AM so they could get everything ready. Even Hotaru came. Before then, Saki took Riko food shopping. Saki isn't normally off on Saturdays, but she just happened to get the day off. Once they were gone, everyone except Kyoya went to the Tasogare house to set everything up. Chinami and Fukiko helped decorate the house with some party decorations. Arinao brought out the food, including the stuff Sunbeam made. But he doesn't know that she made it, and assumed Saki did. Anzu put all the presents in one place. Hikage and Marina made sure everything was in place. The fairies secretly double checked. Soon, at about 11:00, Marina saw the car pull into the driveway.

"Guys! They're back! Get ready!" Marina exclaimed.

"Where's Kyoya? He's supposed to be here right now!" Fukiko said.

"I don't know," Anzu said.

Beep beep. "I got a text!" Marina said.

"What's it say? What's it say?" Chinami asked.

"It says, _'Can't find present. I'm freaking out. I'll get there when I find it. Lovebeam's helping me look. I will find it or die trying.'_ That's it," Marina said.

"Get in position!" Hikage exclaimed. Everyone got in position. The first thing they heard was Riko's voice.

"How come some people think-"

"SURPRISE!"

* * *

"Where the freak is iiiiiiit?!" Kyoya yelled as he dug through his clothing drawer. The gift bag containing the Moomin dolls is missing! Kyoya tore his room apart looking for them in a panic. He looked under his bed. Nothing. He looked all around his desk. Nothing. He looked in his bed, in his drawers, in his closet. The gift bag is nowhere in sight.

"What's wrong, Kyo-chan?" Lovebeam asked.

"The gift bag! It's gone! Gone gone gone!" Kyoya yelped as he hastily put on his glasses. "I left it right here, and now it's gone! Someone musta took it!"

Lovebeam remembered she put the present she made for Riko in there. "I'll help you look for it. I'll go downstairs," Lovebeam told him calmly before flying downstairs to look for the bag. Kyoya couldn't help but be surprised that Lovebeam is being calm. Usually she flips out and acts like a brat. She really has grown up since she first came to his house last year. But Kyoya couldn't think about that now. He had to look for Riko's present, and fast.

He and Lovebeam looked all over the place for it. They went downstairs and looked everywhere. Under the dining room table, under the couches, in the basement, in the bathroom. Unfortunately, the gift bag is nowhere in sight, and worst of all, Kyoya's completely late to the party. "Uuuuuugh! Where the flip is it?! If I don't find it soon, I'll have completely ruined the party!" Kyoya roared.

"Any luck?" Lovebeam asked.

Kyoya sighed grimly. "No."

"It's gotta be here somewhere. I'll keep looking," Lovebeam looked through some couch cushions. Again, she turned up nothing.

An hour passed. It's almost noon. Kyoya wished he was at the party right now. But where could the bag have gone? He and Lovebeam searched high and low for that gift bag. Even Kayoko helped out. But alas, they turned up nothing. It was like the bag just disappeared into thin air. That is…

"Hey, Kayoko. Are you still up for the baby shower tonight?" Jiroemon asked out of the blue.

"Yes, I'm going. Why do you ask?" Kayoko asked as she looked all over the dining room table.

"I wanted to ask where you got those dolls. They're just precious! Iwata-san is going to love-"

Dolls. He said dolls. Kyoya walked over to him. "Did you just say dolls?!"

Jiroemon became a little confused by Kyoya's sudden desperate look. "Yes. The ones in that purple flower bag. I put it in my car when I went to get gas."

"YOU TOOK THEM?! DAD, YOU IDIOT! THOSE ARE BIRTHDAY PRESENTS WE GOT FOR RIKO!" Kyoya shouted so loud Jiroemon had to cover his ears. Kayoko ran over to Kyoya and hugged him so he wouldn't do anything crazy.

"Now now, Kyoya. He didn't know," Kayoko said.

"Oh my word! Those were birthday presents for your friend?!" Jiroemon yelped as the revelation hit him on the head. "I'm so sorry!"

"Now I'm late to the party because of you! Come on! We're going to Riko's house! NOW!" Kyoya growled. Jiroemon obeyed his angry son's command without question. Much to Kyoya's relief, what Jiroemon said is true. The gift bag was in the car, just on the front seat. He and Lovebeam got in the front seat.

* * *

"I got this for you, Riko," Anzu handed Riko a sloppily wrapped present. Riko opened it to find a little Pusheen plushie.

"Aww! It's a kitty plushie! Thanks, An-chan!" Riko chirped gratefully and hugged her blonde friend.

"This one's from me," Fukiko said sheepishly, handing Riko a small box. Riko opened it to find a small bracelet inside. "Sorry I don't know much about what you like."

"It's okay! Thanks," Riko said with a smile.

"Here. For you," Hotaru handed Riko a slightly bigger box. Riko opened it to find a little framed watercolor painting of a grey cat sleeping under a tree. "I found it at a little shop and thought it was cute."

"It is! Thanks!" Riko exclaimed gratefully.

"I...got this pony toy for you," Marina handed Riko a small My Little Pony toy. A purple unicorn.

"Thanks, Mari-chan!" Riko exclaimed.

Saki bought Riko some cute anime character shirts from the mall. Arinao bought Riko a new anime DVD. Hikage bought Riko some Sailor Moon mangas. Rina just simply handed Riko a crude drawing of a cat and a unicorn frolicking in a meadow full of flowers and rainbows. The fairies secretly gave her their own gifts: a little cat key chain from Moonbeam, a cat bookmark from Sunbeam, and a cute little pink and white lace ribbon from Starbeam. Anzu took the fairies with her to the mall once and they picked their own gifts for her. Chinami just gave Riko a little purple notebook she found in the mall.

Riko couldn't believe her friends did all of this for her. She's never had a birthday party before, nor has she ever had anyone her own age bother to even care about her or make her feel appreciated like this. She almost found herself near tears, but she tried to keep them inside. Birthdays are supposed to be happy days. No tears allowed. But she did notice one of her friends is missing. Will he come or not? Riko wished he came.

"Where's Kyo-chan?" Riko asked.

"He'll be here! He said he'll be coming late," Marina told her reassuringly, but even she knew that her reassurance sounded forced. She had to wonder how he lost his present.

_KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK!_ "Hey! Riko! It's me, Kyoya!"

"Kyo-chan?!" Riko shot up from the chair and ran to answer the door. She opened it to find a tired Kyoya, with his hands on his knees, with a purple flowery gift bag hanging from his arms. Kyoya kept gasping for breath, like he ran a marathon, even though he can't run yet. "You okay?"

"I...I found it...sorry...I'm late...took me...an hour...to find the gift…" Kyoya gasped in between breaths.

"Hey! You're finally here, slowpoke!" Marina exclaimed.

Anzu shot a disappointed look at her. "Really, Mari," She took Kyoya's hand. "Come inside."

"Want some water?" Hotaru asked. "I can get some."

"Yes please," Kyoya said as he slumped on the couch. He handed Riko the gift bag. "Here. For you."

"Sorry we took so long. Kyo-chan's dad thought the present was something for a baby shower and had it in his car," Lovebeam said. Riko paid no heed, as she dug through the gift bag.

When she pulled it out, she was absolutely speechless. In the flowery gift bag were two Moomin dolls-Moomin and Floren-in absolutely perfect condition. For a moment, Riko thought she was dreaming. But she felt the soft fabric. She held them in her hands. She pulled something else out, which turned out to be a purple scarf with some grey cat faces on it. Riko was just blown away. All she did was stare at the presents in her hand with an odd look, like she was staring at Heaven itself.

"I remembered your messed up Moomin doll, and I had Mom order those for you," Kyoya told her with a smile after he drank some much needed cold water.

"I made that scarf for you from scratch! Do you like it?" Lovebeam told her cheerfully, her round, chubby cheeks turning a cheery pink color.

Riko said nothing. "You...did all of this...for me?" She finally choked out.

"Yeah," Kyoya said.

All of a sudden, Riko fell to her knees. Much to everyone's shock, tears came right out of Riko's eyes. If that wasn't enough, Riko suddenly cried loudly, like she had a bad day.

"Uh...did we do something bad?" Lovebeam asked.

"Why are you crying?! You're supposed to be happy!" Rina exclaimed, shocked by Riko's change in demeanor.

Saki and Arinao looked at each other with confused faces. "Don't you...like it?" Lovebeam asked worriedly.

"I...I...I AM happy!" Riko cried. "I...I...I've always wanted to have a big birthday party like this...for a long time. But nobody my age has ever cared about me like this before! Everyone at school used to say, _'You'll never have a birthday party! Nobody wants to be friends with a stupid weirdo crybaby like you, so get over it!'_ For a while...I believed them. I was convinced I'd never have friends or be able to have a birthday party like other girls…but...you all went and did all of this for me…how can I thank you…?" Riko blubbered.

"Those lonely days are over now, Riko," Anzu told her gently as she put a hand on her shoulder. "Besides, they're the stupid ones for not seeing how wonderful you are."

"Yeah. You're our friend, and nobody can take that away from us or you!" Chinami chimed in cheerfully.

Riko squeezed her Moomin dolls. "Thank you so much...Kyo-chan...everyone...for the first time in my life I actually feel fulfilled!"

"You're exaggerating," Marina said modestly. But in a way, she had to agree. Not only that, Marina herself felt rather fulfilled. Having friends does make everything better after all.

"Come on! Who's up for some cake?!" Anzu exclaimed.

"Me! Me me me! I get the first piece!" Rina called out.

"No you don't! Riko gets the first piece! It's her birthday," Kyoya scolded.

"No! I want the first piece, and it better be bigger than everybody else's!" Rina whined playfully. Everyone laughed. Riko hugged her Moomin dolls and put them snugly on her bed, right between Snufkin and Little My.

"There. Perfect," Riko said as she brushed Floren's fringe to make it look nice. Moonbeam floated into her room.

"They're cute," Moonbeam said.

"Thanks."

"You really are lucky to have such wonderful people who care about you," Moonbeam told her.

"Me too. I used to think I'd never find friends or people who liked me. But...now I don't have to worry anymore!" Riko exclaimed cheerfully, looking happier than she'd ever been.

This made Moonbeam smile brightly. "We'll always be friends, won't we?"

"Of course we will! Thanks for the present. I'll take good care of it and everything else."

"You're welcome."

"Also…" Riko grabbed her old Moomin doll, the one that has chocolate milk on its nose, and handed it to Moonbeam. "Sorry its so big. But if you want, you can keep this. I know Kyo-chan got me new dolls so I can get rid of this one, but...it's been with me since I was a baby, and I can't bring myself to throw him away. That'd be mean."

It was heavy like Riko said, but Moonbeam put the doll back on Riko's bed. "Thank you."

"I...I figure if this whole thing ends and we wind up never seeing each other again, you can have something to remember me by."

"I appreciate it. But we will see each other again! I mean, there's no law that says we can't travel in between worlds. We've done it for a hundred years, and we can still do it," Moonbeam told her reassuringly.

"Good point," Riko said.

"Aww, no fair! You got a big piece, Fukiko!" Marina complained.

"Sorry! It's cut all weird!" Fukiko argued.

"Yumiko! No cake for you! This is people food, not doggy food!" Saki exclaimed, which got a laugh out of Anzu and Kyoya.

"Riko, dear! Come down! You want some cake, don't you?" Hotaru called out from downstairs.

"Coming!" Riko yelled before turning to Moonbeam. "I'll save some for you. Want some?"

"Oh yes!"

Riko and Moonbeam sprinted downstairs, leaving the Moomin dolls safely tucked away in her room. There was no doubt about it. Today was the best birthday ever.


	41. A New Enemy? I Know You!

Chapter 37: A New Enemy? Wait! I Know You!

Hotaru left Hikage alone to gather his thoughts. She figured he needed some alone time. But talking with him definitely helped her learn a lot about not just him, but Riko as well. Since it was almost noon, she still had time to hang around town before dinner, so this gave her a perfect opportunity. She pulled out her cell phone, dialed Riko's number, and held it right to her cheek.

_"Hello?"_

"Riko-chan. Is that you?"

_"Hi, Hotaru-chan! What's up?"_ Hotaru let out a sigh of relief. Riko sounded happy.

"Do you mind if I drop by your house in a bit?"

_"Sure. But I'll have to ask Mom and Dad. I'll be back."_

Hotaru could hear Riko's voice in the background, along with her parents. She flinched a little when she heard a cheerful _"Yay!" _in the background. _"They said yes! They said An-chan, Kyo-chan, and everyone else can come too!"_

"That's good to hear. I talked to Hikage-kun just now."

Riko fell silent for a brief moment. _"...You did?"_

"Yes. Let's talk about it more when I get there. Okay?"

_"Sure thing. Do your parents know you're coming to my house?"_

"I'll let them know right after this."

_"Okay. Mom and Dad are always going on and on about how I absolutely need to tell them where I'm at at all times, even when they already know."_

Hotaru let out a chuckle. She could definitely relate to that. "I'll bet. I'll see you in a few minutes. Okay? Bye."

_"Bye!"_

With that, Hotaru ended the call, but then dialed her house phone. "Dad? Hi, it's Hotaru. I'm going to my friend Riko's house. Is that okay? Yes. Yes. She's having a bit of a hard time, and I want to help her out. Yes. Thanks. I appreciate it. Don't worry. I'll be back by dinner. Okay. Bye."

Since Hotaru's house was right by the school, it did take a while to get to Riko's house on foot. She didn't mind the walk, though. She liked being alone to take in the scenery and gather her thoughts. By the time she got there, Anzu, Kyoya, Umi, Sorane, and even Fukiko and Chinami had come by.

Riko saw Hotaru and waved to her before they went in the house. Saki was outside planting some shrubs into the front yard. Arinao was in the den, working on his newest novel. Marina, Rina, Umi, and Kyoya were playing a game of Jenga. Rina was sitting on Marina's lap, trying to pull a block out of the wobbly tower.

"Come on, Rina. You can do it," Marina told her gently. But as precisely as Rina tried, the block came out, pulling the entire tower down with it.

"Awwww!"

"That's okay! Who's up for a rematch?" Kyoya asked.

Rina waved her arm around. "I am! I am!" With that, the kids picked up the blocks and tried again.

Umi was quick to put some blocks back on the stool they were using as a little table. "This is fun! I haven't played this in a long time."

Marina noticed that Rina kept glancing out the window, as though she was expecting someone to come by. "What's up? You expecting somebody?"

Rina nodded. "My friends. They said they'd come over today. I hope they get here."

"Maybe they will, maybe they won't," Marina added.

Thankfully, Rina's prayers were answered. _Beep! Beep!_ A car honked outside the window, and Rina dashed outside the house with a radiant smile. It must be confessed that she knocked Lovebeam over by accident. "Goodness. She has no manners, does she?" Lovebeam grumbled, scratching one of her long ears. All Starbeam could do was chuckle.

Then, Rina stormed back through the door, with the very same smile. Behind her were three girls. Rina ran over to Riko and grabbed her arm. "Ai-chan, Mimi-chan, Touko-chan! This is my super cool big sister, Riko!"

Riko thought she was dreaming. There were three girls younger than herself sizing her up with smiles on their faces. She was so sure Rina was going to call her names right in front of them and tell them what a horrible big sister she is. Had Rina finally changed at last? "Is it true you like My Little Pony?" The girl named Ai asked.

"Rina-chan says you're great at drawing! Can we see some of your drawings?" The girl named Mimi said.

"Rina-chan says you play Pokemon! Can I have a battle with you? I'm gonna win, just so you know!" The girl named Touko exclaimed confidently, holding out a red Nintendo 3DS.

Riko wasn't sure what she should say to them. But she did have the courage to say one thing. "You've finally made some friends, huh?"

Rina nodded.

Riko rubbed Rina's hair gently. "I'm so proud of you, lil sis."

Rina wished this could go on forever. Riko and Touko battled, but Riko won. After that, Rina played with her own friends in her room while Riko hung out with her friends. Kyoya, Umi, and Marina sat down to watch an anime together, whereas was outside helping Saki with planting the shrubs. Riko was about to get something to drink until Hotaru gently pulled her aside.

"What's up?" Riko asked.

Hotaru told her the truth.

Riko wished she could be happy that Hotaru did this for her, but she wasn't. She didn't know what to feel about it. Angry? Embarrassed? Happy? She wasn't sure. She did know one thing, though. "...He was still angry, wasn't he?"

"At first, yes. But I managed to talk him down and be honest with him. He just...doesn't want his precious little sister getting hurt. That's all. He didn't mean to yell at you," Hotaru told her kindly.

"I know," Deep in the confines of her heart, Riko knew Hikage didn't mean it. In fact, if someone yelled at her, he'd make sure they felt his wrath. Nobody ever messed with his sister on his watch. He always knew that yelling made her cry, and she knew why he did it today, too. Hikage always worried about her. He probably yelled because he was worried, confused, and wasn't sure how to deal with finding out his sister's secret identity.

During the time she and the gang went to Youko's house, it wasn't hard to untangle the cobwebs in her head and figure things out. Although she was frightened by his yelling, Riko never held it against him. She knew if she did, she wouldn't feel like she was a good sister, especially after all the good things he did for her. It wasn't like he hated her, and it wasn't like he suspected she was doing something bad or malicious. She was certain of that.

"He'll apologize after he's cooled off. Don't worry," Hotaru gently rubbed Riko's head with her hand, wearing a warm smile. "Have some faith. He understands."

Riko's lips curled up, even though she didn't look Hotaru in the face. "Sorry you had to do that for me. You didn't have to."

"It's okay. I wanted to. You're both my dearest friends, and I don't like seeing you fight."

"Me too."

* * *

Hikage picked up a stick and stroke it against the chain link fence. He liked the vibrating feeling it gave his arm, and the sound was oddly soothing. He wasn't sure why. But how could he make it up to Riko? When he noticed a patch of dirt in front of his foot, he kneeled down and began drawing on it with the stick. His body seemed to move on its own, completely free of his control. He didn't mind, though. It'd give him time to think. Maybe this would help him come up with something.

Then he stopped to see what he drew. It was a cute, chibi cat face, with dots for eyes and two lines on each cheek for whiskers. A cat? Why did he draw that, he wondered. Then again, Riko adored cats and anything related to them, from merchandise to food. If he remembered correctly, Riko's all time favorite food was Choco Kitties, palm sized chocolate candies shaped like chibi cat faces, with peanut butter ears and whiskers, with the inside having nothing but peanut butter.

That's it! Choco Kitties! He could buy a whole pack of them and he and Riko could eat them together! He even had some money on him. Just as he thought about that, a memory popped up in his head. When he and Riko were younger, whenever Hikage saved enough money or saw that Riko was sad, he would run to the store, buy two packs of Choco Kitties, and eat them with Riko behind a big tree in their old backyard. They did this a lot, and they had to be discreet about it or their parents would get mad at them for eating junk food before dinner. Riko loves Choco Kitties, but Hikage had to admit, they tasted better when enjoying them with someone else.

He rummaged through his pocket and pulled out some crumpled up dollar bills before counting them. "Ten dollars. That's perfect!" The store was nearby, so he could easily walk there, run in, and grab some within twenty minutes if he added the time needed to get home. And he did just that: run inside, grab two packs of Choco Kitties, pay for them, and leave.

A dark shadow loomed over him from atop of a phone line, not that he noticed.

"Riko'll be so psyched! She hasn't had Choco Kitties in a while!" Hikage exclaimed, taking care to not rock the bag too hard. He didn't want them to get squished. He wasn't worried about them melting, since it was still chilly out. "I really hope she forgives me."

"Why do you care so much?"

"Huh?"

* * *

"Saki? Do you know where Hikage is?" Arinao asked as he came out onto the backyard.

"Last I heard he was at the middle school shooting hoops," Saki replied as she took off her gardening gloves.

Arinao looked down at his watch. "I told him to be back by three, but it's already three thirty, and he's not answering his phone."

Since Riko's hearing was hypersensitive, she happened to overhear. Moonbeam's ears twitched as well. "Is your brother late coming home sometimes?" Moonbeam asked curiously.

"Only sometimes," Riko replied. But Arinao had a point. Hikage usually always came home on time. What was taking him so long? She hoped nothing happened to him. Saki and Arinao came back inside.

Sorane pulled out a camera and gathered the Pretty Cure kids together. "Let's take a picture, but with just us Pretty Cure gang."

"Sure. Great idea," Sunbeam whispered.

Everyone except Fukiko and Chinami came out onto the backyard. Chinami and Fukiko were sitting in the living room talking about typical girl stuff, so they didn't mind having some girl-to-girl bonding time to themselves.

Sorane got the camera set on the tripod and ran to the group. "Say…"

"Fuzzy pickles!" Riko blurted out.

_Flash!_ The camera went off. Soon, they ran around taking more pictures. Laughing, rolling on the grass, running around barefoot, playing, spinning each other around, Sorane took pictures like crazy. These were memories everyone wanted to preserve forever. Riko even invited Fukiko, Chinami, Rina, and her friends to come out and play.

"Aren't we a little old for this rough housing?" Chinami asked.

"Oh, come on! There's nothing wrong with getting a little dirty once in a while!" Umi exclaimed, taking Chinami by the hand and proceeding to spin her around.

"Getting...dizzy..." Chinami's eyesight was blurry and her head was spinning.

The fairies kept themselves out of sight, but they also played around and frolicked in their part of the yard. It was at this time that Saki came out and ran to a neighbor's house right next door. "Fujisaki-san? Fujisaki-san?" She didn't sound hysterical, but her voice was definitely being swallowed by worry.

An old woman with thick glasses came out. "Hello, Tasogare-san. What's wrong?"

"My son hasn't come home yet. I think he's gone missing. Can you help me look for him?"

The kids were too busy playing to notice Zenjin creeping up behind Saki, smacking her across the back of her head. The force of the blow was so strong that she fell on the sidewalk. The concrete tore open some lacerations on her hands and knee. "Oh my!"

Everyone stopped when they heard the scream. Riko was the first to see it. Zenjin exposed Fujisaki's Soul Portal, and dunked his head inside it. "HEY! Leave her alone!"

"No! Riko!" Chinami tried to grab her, but Riko had already charged at Zenjin. She rammed into him so hard that he fell to the ground. But he was successful in pulling out her Soul Orb.

"What's going on here?!" Arinao yelled. Some neighbors began trickling out of their homes, curious as to what they were seeing.

The girls wanted to transform right then and there, but one thing kept them from doing so: Saki, Arinao, Rina, and all their friends were outside, observing the horrible scene, along with the neighbors. Zenjin turned the Soul Portal into a big black pelican. Not only that, he snapped his fingers, and a huge army of black Transparent appeared. The pelican and the army of black blobs prompted everyone to run for their lives. Some mothers grabbed their children. Others dropped some personal belongings as they were sprinting away.

The girls were conflicted. Should they transform or not? They didn't have time to be conflicted, as Saki and Arinao tried to grab them and take them away. "We have to go! It's too dangerous!" Saki yelled as she grabbed Riko's arm and tried to take her away, right as the giant pelican pecked at some roof tiles on a house.

"But...but Mom! I-"

"No buts! We're leaving!" Arinao exclaimed as he scooped Rina in his arms. He tried to take Umi by the arm, but she ran away before he could do anything.

Even Riko knew it. The secret couldn't be kept any longer. "WAIT!" Riko yelled as she pried Saki's arm off of her and pulled out her Heart Lighter. "Girls! We transform now!" She shouted boldly.

"What?! In front of your parents?!" Hotaru exclaimed, shocked at Riko's split second decision.

"Are you crazy?!" Marina yelped.

"Transform...?" Chinami was stumped. What did they mean by that?

"They're gonna find out!" Anzu exclaimed.

"Find out what?! We have no time for this!" Arinao shouted.

"What choice do we have?! They're gonna find out anyway, and Fujisaki-san needs our help!" Riko exclaimed.

Everyone looked at each other. She had a good point. Riko turned to face her surprised parents. "Mom. Dad. Rina. I'm sorry. I've been keeping something from you. We all have. You're more than welcome to get mad after this. But…"

The girls activated their Heart Lighters. "Pretty Cure, let the light shine!"

Saki, Arinao, Rina, Chinami, and all of Rina's friends watched in awe as the girls transformed into what appeared to be magical girl super heroes. They couldn't believe it. At first they thought they were dreaming. But they weren't. If Zenjin turning Fujisaki's soul into a gigantic black pelican was real, then this had to be, too.

"I am the light that will brighten up your world, Cure Twilight!"

"I am the lights that illuminate the darkness, Cure Starlight!"

"I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

"I am the light that will warm your heart, Cure Dusk!"

"I am the light whose wings radiate the sky, Cure Skylight!"

"I am the light that sparkles on the ocean waves, Cure Sealight!"

"We will banish the darkness with the light in our hearts! We are the Luminous Six! Luminous Pretty Cure!"

Touko was the first to speak once the girls made their way toward the monster. "Wow! Rina-chan, you never told us your sister was a superhero!"

"Does she have magical powers?!" Mimi asked excitedly.

"Is she gonna beat the bad guy?" Ai asked calmly.

"Come on, girls. We have to go someplace safe," Fukiko and Kyoya slowly herded them away from their house like they were shepherds herding sheep. Arinao went in to grab the cats while Saki went in to get Yumiko. Once they got the animals in their hands, they ran from the scene.

Cure Twilight pointed at Zenjin. "We've had it up to here with your evil deeds!"

"Think I care?" Zenjin deadpanned as the pelican tried to peck at them. Cure Dawn grabbed its beak and threw it on the street. Cure Dusk flew down and gave it a flurry of punches and kicks. She wanted to do more, but the pelican used one of its wings to swat her away.

"Starlight Shower!" Cure Starlight made a shower of stars fall from the sky, but the pelican flew away, avoiding them.

Cure Twilight got her claws out, flew toward the pelican, and tried to slash one of its wings. But the pelican got the upper hand and swatted her away as well. But she recovered quickly and tried to fly toward it again. "Twilight Serenade!" Cure Twilight shot a ray of light at the pelican, but it evaded it.

"Dusk Medley!" Cure Dusk fired some flaming musical notes at it, but the pelican caught them all with its beak and ate them. Dusk's face contorted and she squeezed her eyes shut. "Ew! That's so gross! Won't that hurt?"

Cure Skylight swooped in and flew all around the pelican, hoping to make it dizzy. The pelican tried to peck at her a few times, but Skylight managed to hold it off with her cutlass. At one point, she wound up slashing the skin just above its left eye. The pelican roared in pain as Skylight unleashed a Feather Dance attack. Then, Cure Dawn slammed it on the head with her nun chucks. However, it knocked her away just as quickly. She tried to chain it down with her glowing chains, but the pelican kept flying away.

"Sealight! You handle those black blobby things!" Twilight commanded.

"Got it!" Sealight exclaimed. "Emerald Tsunami!" A huge, glowing green tsunami swept all of the Transparent away. Thankfully, Umi's attack was strong but not to the point where it destroyed anything. Plus, most of the citizens evacuated so nobody was hurt.

Starlight tried to slash the pelican with her naginata, but the naughty bird swatted it away, along with Hotaru. "Fiery Dusk Arrow!" Cure Dusk tried to land some hits on it, but the pelican knocked those away, too.

"Twilight Masquerade!" Thankfully, Cure Twilight's attack managed to hit the pelican. But it wasn't enough to turn it back to normal.

Starlight tried to slash it with her naginata yet again, but the pelican avoided it. The pelican tried to peck at her, but Starlight held its beak up with her naginata, managing to hold it off long enough for Skylight to unleash an Aerial Ace attack on it. The pelican let go of the naginata, and Starlight did three back flips before punching it square in the face, so hard that it rolled on the street a bit, rolling into the front of a house. It was enough to demolish the front of it, but everything else is in tact, and nobody's in there, so Starlight didn't have to worry about unknowingly hurting someone.

"This thing's fast!" Skylight exclaimed.

"Zenjiiiiiin!" The fairies tried to grab him, but he swiped his red cape around himself before disappearing.

Sunbeam growled and shook her fists up and down. "Urrrrrgh! I hate it when he does that!"

"You're not the only one," Starbeam added.

"Dawn Sunny Whip!" Cure Dawn's glowing whip coiled around the pelican's legs. She hoped she would be strong enough to hold it down. Since the pelican was larger than she, however, the CS pulled Dawn into the air and flapped around to shake her off. Cure Dawn could feel her head pounding with every swing.

"Sealight Ocean!" A blast of green water shot out of Cure Sealight's palms, hitting the pelican and uncoiling Cure Dawn's whip. Sealight was also quick to create a bubble to break Cure Dawn's fall and set her gently down on the street.

"Thanks, Sealight!"

"Don't mention it! Yeek!" The pelican used one of its wings to smack Sealight onto the roof of someone's house. It must be confessed that the blow was so strong it left a huge hole in the roof. The roof tiles broke and fell on the front yard, breaking or knocking over a gargoyle statue and some flower pots.

"Heeeeey birdie! You can't catch us!" Lovebeam taunted in a condescending sing-songy voice as she and her sisters flitted in front of the pelican like annoying flies. The pelican let out a squawk as it tried to smack the annoying fairies out of its line of sight. But they were very agile because of their small size, and being small made them quicker to react and move away from any danger.

"Cover your ears everyone!" Skylight commanded.

Everyone did as asked. Even the fairies.

"Skyward Scream!" With a piercing howl, Skylight rendered the pelican dizzier than someone on a Tilt-A-Whirl at a carnival. The pelican wobbled around making a weird sound, looking so unbalanced it could fall over at any moment.

"Let's finish this! Mandarin Dusk Inferno!" Cure Dusk wasted no time calling forth a flaming tornado that consumed the pelican. But like before, it wasn't enough to turn it back to normal, not that Dusk cared.

"Golden Dawn Explosion!" Cure Dawn slammed her nun chucks on the pelican's beak and an explosion of light consumed it. Again, it didn't make it disintegrate.

"Starlight Kick!" Starlight kicked the pelican on its side, sending it falling on the concrete. Cure Dawn wasted no time making a chain of light and tying it tightly around the pelican's beak so it wouldn't be able to open it or peck anything.

The pelican tried using its wings to pry the chain off. It didn't work. Then it tried to use its webbed feet to pry it off. That didn't work either. It suddenly began running toward a tree and banging its head against it in a miserable attempt to break it off. _BAM! BAM! BAM!_

"Skylight Phoenix!" Skylight encased herself in a white light, which formed the shape of a large bird. With outstretched wings, she slashed at the screaming pelican. It too wasn't enough to turn it back to normal, but she didn't care.

Sunbeam, Moonbeam, Starbeam, and Lovebeam all fired beams of light at the pelican's eyes. They hit its eyes, managing to render it blind and unable to see properly. All six girls landed many punches and kicks on it to weaken it some more before bringing out their final finishing move, just to make sure it's completely weakened. "Pretty Cure Shining Light!"

With their radiant light, the pelican screamed as it disintegrated into pieces, becoming nothing more than a plain, untainted Soul Orb. Twilight ran over to it and gave it back to Fujisaki. Saki, Arinao, Rina, and Rina's friends all watched from behind their house, in awe of the sight of the children's victory.

No, better yet, the fact that they turned into magical superheroes.

Their child was a superhero? Hikage was right all along! And those plushies can move and talk! They were real this whole time, too?

"You did it, girls!" Kyoya cheered from behind the house.

"Kyoya! You knew about this?!" Arinao yelled. All Kyoya did was force a smile and let out a rueful laugh. Boy, was he going to be in for an earful.

All smiles, the girls high fived each other for another job well done. They were about to de-transform until-

"Hey, Cai! That's your cue! Slice and dice'em!" Zenjin? Didn't he disappear?

A blast of dark energy suddenly shot out at the group, striking Cure Twilight right in the chest. The force was so strong she rolled on the concrete. Cures Dawn and Sealight were quick to grab her before she got seriously hurt. "You okay?!" Cure Dawn asked.

"Owwww!"

"I'll take that as a yes," Moonbeam added.

"Me too," Sealight piped in.

Cure Dusk made flames consume her fists, glaring in every direction. "Who's there?! Show yourself?!"

They soon got their answer in the form of a lone figure giving them a glare that was cold as ice. He donned a black, sleeveless, unbuttoned vest with no shirt underneath, along with a pair of black pants with his legs wrapped in silver chains. He also donned black army boots and hanging from his belt was a small dagger tucked neatly in its sheath. The only article of clothing that wasn't black were the white cloths covering his head and face, showing nothing but his steely, soulless grey eyes. One look at them could convince someone that there was no sign of human emotion within them.

The girls froze in place, perplexed by this strange person's unprecedented appearance. Cure Dusk finally broke the silence. "Okay. Who are you, where did you come from, and why have we never seen or heard of you until now?"

"Last minute late season new character?" Twilight mumbled to herself.

Moonbeam clung to Sunbeam's arm. "I don't like the looks of this."

"Me either."

Lovebeam flitted over to Kyoya and buried herself in Kyoya's shirt. He could feel her tiny body trembling and stroke her with his fingers. It did nothing to calm her down. Whoever this guy was, Kyoya could tell he was bad news, and he didn't want to get caught in the crossfire.

Without even blinking, the black clad boy swiftly charged at Cure Twilight and dug her fist into her stomach. The purple girl found herself flying over the street, gasping for air.

"Twilight!" Cures Starlight and Skylight soared into the sky, flying fast enough to catch up to her and catch her right before she could hit a tree. Once they caught her, they gently set her back down on her feet.

"Oww..."

"You're not hurt, are you?" Starlight asked.

"Yes! Yes, I am hurt!" Twilight snapped.

Cure Dusk's fists were blazing. "You mess with my friends, you mess with me! Flame Fist Fury!" She charged at the boy, attempting to land some third degree burns on him. He dodged every single punch. Within seconds, he grabbed Cure Dusk's one fist and punched her square in the jaw, sending her flying into a tree.

"Dusk!" Sealight couldn't react in time, as Cure Dusk had already hit the tree.

Both Skylight and Sealight leaped into the sky before descending with their legs outstretched. The black clad boy grabbed both of their legs, spun them around like he was a revolving carnival ride, and released them. Sealight managed to create a bubble to stop herself from both hurting herself and destroying someone's house. Skylight wasn't so lucky, as she fell right into someone's hedges, her wings covered in leaves and twigs.

Cure Dawn charged at the boy, spinning her legs around in a flurry of kicks, all of which the boy held off. He grabbed Dawn by the hair and threw her onto the concrete like she was a rag doll. Cure Twilight couldn't grab her quickly enough.

"Oh God! He's so strong!" Moonbeam trembled, clinging to Sunbeam like a lost child.

"Now you're gonna get it!" Twilight roared, her hands ready. "Twilight-"

A blast of energy shot at her once again. Twilight screamed and fell back.

"Twi!" Cure Dawn struggled to get to her feet, managing to lurch a step forward until the black clad boy smacked her across the head. She stumbled onto the concrete.

"Enough is enough!" Starlight stood before the boy, pointing her naginata at him. "Who are you and why are you attacking us?!" She roared.

The boy smirked. "Pathetic."

Before Starlight could even move, the boy knocked her naginata out of her hand, grabbed her by the neck and threw her on the concrete. Starlight screamed so loud she made Twilight cover her ears.

"Everyone!" The fairies sans Lovebeam flitted over to their fallen friends.

Fallen wasn't exactly the right word, but they were still alive. Saki buried her face into Arinao's chest. Cure Twilight gently pushed Dawn off of herself and stammered to her feet. This guy was strong. Just who exactly was he? "I don't know who you are..." She growled in a low voice, like an angry cat ready to hiss and attack. "...But nobody messes with my friends!" She charged forward, her claws unsheathed...

Only for a strong grip on her arm to yank her into the air and throw her into someone's hedges. The leaves and twigs dug into her exposed skin, but this was no time to be fussy. Her nostils happened to catch the faint scent of sweaty socks.

Wait...sweaty socks?

Something about that scent was familiar. She had smelled it many times before. It was practically burned into her brain.

"Starlight Shower!" Recovering quickly, Cure Starlight commanded a storm of stars to rain down on the boy. There were so many of them, and they fell so quickly that for once, the boy couldn't evade them like he wanted to. Before he could retaliate, his chest was met with two punches from Cures Sealight and Skylight.

_'I have to unmask him!'_ Cure Twilight told herself. Like a fast moving cat, she grabbed the cloth on his face and pulled it right off. Some of her claws happened to rip into the cloth and as she moved, it ripped right open.

Cure Twilight suddenly stopped, eyes slamming open wide, as though the entire world had stopped completely. An icy cold chill ran right down her spine, sweat running down her temples.

* * *

_Darkness._

_That was all that surrounded an unconscious Hikage._

_"Ugh...oww..." Hikage sat up and rubbed his head. But upon opening his eyes, he saw nothing but darkness all around. Absolutely nothing. "What happened to me?" He stood up and tried to move, but he ran into something hard, blocking his path. "Urgh! What the?!"_

_The silver bars of a cage had grown out from the darkness. The cage itself was shaped like an egg, resembling a bird cage, but without the perch that birds would sit on. "Hey! Let me out!" Hikage gripped the bars and pulled on them as hard as he could, but they wouldn't budge. He even resorted to punching and kicking the bars. Again, that didn't work._

_"Doh...where the heck am I?"_

_A flash of light appeared five feet away from him, far enough for him to be unable to reach it. It became a large oval shape, and it showed an image of Riko as Cure Twilight. She was scared._

_Hikage's blood ran cold. He knew that look anywhere._

_"Riko! Hey, Riko! Can you hear me?! Get me outta here!" He yelled._

"Hi-Hikage...?"

"Looks like you've unmasked me, huh?" The boy's face had been revealed. It was Hikage, only his hair and eyes had been dyed different colors. His curly brown hair had turned silver, and his eyes a steel grey. "No matter. None of you swines can defeat me anyway," Even though Hikage was talking, his voice had none of the warmth and kindness he originally had.

_"Is that...me talking?" Hikage asked, trapped in the confines of his mind._

"What happened to you?!" Cure Dawn yelled.

"Hikage! It's me, Riko! Your sister!" Cure Twilight cried, hoping to get through to him. Alas, her plea went unheard.

"His name is Caiaphas, you dolts!"

Zenjin descended to the ground and gave Hikage-or Caiaphas as he called him-a hug. He wrapped his arms around Caiaphas from behind. "Isn't my newest creation wonderful? He's my new friend."

New friend? Newest creation? Caiaphas? Cure Twilight's mind was racing, and she could feel her legs trembling. What had he done to Hikage?! Cure Dusk shot some flaming musical notes at Zenjin, but Caiaphas knocked them all away with just a few punches.

"What did you do to Hikage?!" Cure Starlight yelled, her eyes slamming wide open, brimming with rage.

"Boy, you girls are pathetic. You couldn't even save your precious friend here..." Zenjin sneered.

(flashback)

_"Why do you care so much?"_

_"Huh?" Hikage turned around to find Zenjin in front of him. "Who are you?"_

_Zenjin smirked and put a hand on his hip. "You don't know me, so I might as well let you know that those Pretty Cure girls you're friends with? They keep getting in my way."_

_Pretty Cure? Getting in his way? Hikage's smile morphed into a frown, and he pointed his eyes at the silver haired boy. "You've been messing with my sister and her friends, haven't you?!"_

_"Cure Twilight, right? She's a wuss," Zenjin said without any hint of remorse. 'I'm bored with Human Trash. I oughta push his buttons a bit and experiment a little,' Zenjin told himself. "I can't fathom why you'd care so much about a useless, spineless, defective little waste of life-"_

_Before he could finish that sentence, a strong blow struck him in the face. "Call my sister that again, and you're going to wake up breathing through a tube," Hikage wanted to bash his brains in so bad._

_Zenjin suddenly punched him back, sending him rolling to the ground, exposing his Soul Portal. One would think he would stick his head in it like he usually would, but instead, he dug into his stomach and pulled out a small piece of the Energia. It was small enough to fit in the palm of his hand, and it was brimming with a black aura. "You will be my ticket to making those idiot girls suffer once and for all."_

_Hikage pulled out his phone and tried to call someone, but Zenjin kicked his hand, sending the phone flying. He stomped over to it and pressed his boot on it five times, reducing it to a pile of broken metal. "HEY! Get away from me!"_

_"Sit still, you arrogant slime!" Zenjin roared, grabbing the Soul Portal and putting the Energia fragment inside. Hikage felt as though his body was on fire, and let out a scream so piercing that it scared a flock of birds right out of the trees. After that, everything went black._

(end flashback)

"So I put a piece of the Energia inside him-with my powers, of course-so he only obeys my commands!" Zenjin explained.

Cure Twilight was frozen in place, her eyes so wide they looked as though they were going to pop right out of her head.

_"No way..." Hikage gripped the bars. "He corrupted me? Just so he can have some minion to serve him?!" No. He wasn't going to be anyone's slave. "HEY! HEEEY! LEMME OUTTA HEEERE!" He screamed. He could tell that nobody could hear him._

"You're going to pay for what you've done!" Starlight roared as she charged at him with intent to punch his lights out. Caiaphas snapped his fingers and a blast of energy appeared from the sky. Cure Dawn tried to make a shield, but she was too slow, and the attack rendered her immobile.

"Star!" Starbeam flitted over to the fallen Cure before glaring at Caiaphas and Zenjin. "You have corrupted someone's child! Have you no remorse for any of the reprehensible machinations you have committed?"

"Buzz off, you trash," Caiaphas hissed.

_"Hey! Stop talking for me, whatever you are!" Hikage roared from within the confines of his mind._

Before Zenjin or Caiaphas could do anything, Zenjin found himself being stuck across the back of his head. Arinao had launched a sneak attack on him using his fist, and grabbed his petticoat. "Dad!"

"How dare you! HOW DARE YOU!" Arinao tried to punch him again, but Caiaphas punched him back, forcing him to release Zenjin.

"We'd better blow this popsicle stand," Zenjin said. "Let's make them suffer."

Caiaphas nodded as the two ascended into the sky. But neither Cure Skylight nor Twilight were going to take this lying down. "Skylight Phoenix!"

With gusto, she charged right at the two rogues, but Caiaphas shot a beam of energy at her, sending her spiraling downward. Cure Twilight on the other hand, managed to grab a hold of one of Caiaphas's army boots. "Hikage! Niichan! You're not Caiaphas! Don't you remember me?! I'm your sister Riko!" Cure Twilight pleaded, her eyes drowning in tears.

Caiaphas glared at her as though he saw a disgusting mutant in a science movie. Zenjin dug one of his boots into her face. "Get off my friend, you trash! He's mine, not yours!"

"No! You better let go of my brother!"

"I...I have no sister."

Cure Twilight stopped. She had a strong grip on his foot, but it was already loosening.

_"Riko! Help me!"_

"If I did have a sister..." Cure Twilight glanced at his eyes only for a brief moment. Those eyes weren't Hikage's. Those eyes were inhuman. Emotionless, without warmth or kindness. "...it wouldn't be a stupid little retard like you."

Riko's hands finally let go of the boot. She found herself descending to the ground. The wings on her boots didn't move. No. That definitely wasn't Hikage. He would never call her that.

_Hikage gripped the bars so tight he wished he could break them with his bare hands. "YOU MONSTER! THAT'S MY SISTER YOU'RE INSULTING! YOU TAKE THAT BACK! TAKE IT BACK! I'M GONNA BEAT YOU BLOODYYYYY!"_

Cures Dawn and Sealight managed to grab Riko. Right then and there, something odd happened. Caiaphas's arm suddenly rose up and punched him square in the face, knocking off both his glasses and a single tooth. Some blood came right out of his mouth before the two finally disappeared into a void.

"What in the world?!"

The kids looked behind them and froze in place. Their parents had all arrived! Sojiro, Kyouichi, Hatoko, Takashi, and Junnosuke! Arinao and Saki came over to them right then and there, with Kyoya, Lovebeam, Chinami, Fukiko, Rina, and Rina's friends trailing behind.

"Care to explain this to us, girls?" Hatoko asked with her arms crossed. Marina didn't like the stern look on her face.

"What's going on? Since when were you superheroes?" Chinami asked worriedly.

Kyoya wheeled over to Riko, who had de-transformed. "I can't believe he'd brainwash Hikage! He's gone too far this time!"

"We'll save him, Riko," Cure Dawn told her reassuringly. But she knew it came out forced.

Riko said nothing. All she did was stare into space with a thousand yard look. It was brief, and the next moment, she rose her hand into the air and slapped herself right in the face. Then again. Again. Again.

"Hey! Stop it!" Kyoya grabbed her arms before she could hit herself any further. This only made Riko start bawling.

"HIKAGEEEEEEEE!"

* * *

"Why'd you punch yourself, Cai?" Zenjin asked, flicking his glowing finger on Caiaphas's cheek.

"I dunno..." Caiaphas hissed. "It was like...my arm suddenly had a mind of its own."

"I bet that piece of trash is still trying to take control of you," Zenjin mused. "No matter. He's weak anyway. You'll help me defeat the Cures, right?"

"Of course I will. I'll do anything for you, Zenjin. Teach me everything you know."

Zenjin's lips curled up. This was great. He could be to Caiaphas what Decebal was to him. He wouldn't be lonely anymore. Now he had an advantage over those girls. Oh, how he loved to break their spirits. He turned around to look at the sunset.

At first, he noticed the scenery looked odd, like it was becoming blurry one moment, then clear the next, then meshing later. He wondered if the sunset was playing tricks on him. He rubbed his eyes with his arm. The blurriness didn't go away right off, but it gradually went back to bring clear.

"What's wrong?" Caiaphas asked in a low voice.

"I don't know. My eyesight is all blurry," He said.

"Are you maybe losing your eyesight?"

"I hope not! I am SO going to give that idiot what she deserves if it kills me!"

He leaped off the rooftop and descended onto the ground. But his eyesight blurred again. This time, it was so blurry he couldn't tell how far he was from a house. But it cleared before he could bump into anything. "Jeez. I wish Decebal could check this out."

_Hikage pounded on the bottom of his cage, sobbing uncontrollably. "Why'd you make me do that?! Why'd you make me call her that?!" His glasses completely fogged up and were wet with tears. "Riko...Riko...I'm so sorry...there's so many things in this world that can and have hurt you. I..." Sobs escaped from his mouth, and he was helpless to stop them. With a final bang on the cage, he shouted, "I should never have let one of them be me!"_


	42. The End of Pretty Cure?

Being reworked


	43. Zenjin's Hideout is Found!

Being reworked


	44. Riko's a Corrupt Sentinel!

Being reworked


	45. Pretty Cure VS Riko the Corrupt Sentinel

Being reworked


	46. Welcome Back, Cure Twilight!

_**ATTENTION: TRIGGER WARNING FOR MENTIONS OF BULLYING.**_

* * *

Chapter 42: Welcome Back! Cure Twilight's Light Shines Through Once More!

Darkness.

Nothing but darkness.

Pitch black all around.

"Ugh…" Riko woke up in her normal clothes to find that everything around her was completely black. Dark, without even the tiniest spec of light shining. "Ow...my head…I feel like someone just hit me with a log…" Riko mused to herself before standing up, rubbing her raven black hair to pacify the pain a bit. But when she opened her eyes, she looked around a little frightfully. "Where am I? What happened to me?"

She looked around. There was absolutely nothing around her but darkness. She didn't like it. She clutched her shirt tightly, pacing around, wondering if there was any way out. "Hellooooo! Can anyone hear me?! Someone help meeee!" Riko yelled.

No answer. "Aww," Then it hit her. "Oh! Now I remember! I was battling Zenjin and he put his hand in me and I was screaming and...!"

The realization hit her like a slap in the face. "Did he...turn me into a Corrupt Sentinel?!" Riko didn't like what that entailed. "Oh God! I hope I'm not hurting anyone or destroying any buildings!" She yelled with her hands on her head. "No. Calm down, Riko. You can get out of this," She reassured herself, trying to calm down and not let her hysteria get the better of her.

She turned around, but stopped when she saw something...or rather, someone. It was herself, but a younger version. A little Riko stood before her with tears in her eyes. She looked to be about seven years old. She was wearing a little blue shirt with cats on it, grey shorts, and pink and white sneakers. Riko calmed down a little upon seeing her. She walked up to the sad version of herself, kneeled before her, and smiled. "What's wrong?" Riko asked.

"I'm sad. Nobody wants to be my friend…" Little Riko whimpered.

"You'll find friends! In fact, you already have! There's An-chan and Kyo-chan and Umi-chan and…" Riko told her happily, but Little Riko cut her off.

"No! They're not real!" Little Riko protested sadly. "None of them are! Everyone hates me, and if they hate me, then they hate you, too!"

"That's not true," Riko told her.

"Everyone hates you because you're hurting them!" Little Riko yelled. "Look!" With a snap of her fingers, a holographic projection appeared in the darkness. It showed a black cat Corrupt Sentinel attacking Cures Dusk and Dawn, sending them flying.

"Riko! Wake up! Please!" Cure Dusk pleaded.

"We know you can hear us!" Cure Starlight yelled before attempting to skewer the black cat's side with her naginata.

Riko's hands flew to her mouth. This couldn't be real. Riko? Hurting her friends? That just couldn't be true. Riko shook her head. "That's not me! I'm a human, not a cat!" She yelled. Then she remembered. She lost the battle with Zenjin, and he stuck his hand in her Soul Portal. Her whole body burned like she was being electrocuted on the electric chair at the highest voltage possible. Riko found herself shaking. "No...this can't be...why am I doing this?"

"You hate them because they're mean to you," Little Riko told her in a cold, icy, robotic voice. "You always hated the world for treating you like garbage, and you still do. In a way, what they say is true. You are a bad person. You don't even know how to be normal. Everyone hates you."

"No! No! I don't believe you!" Riko protested angrily, covering her ears. "I...I need to get out of here! Stop myself from hurting my friends! But what do I do?!"

"Just give up. You're worthless. The world is better off without you," Little Riko hissed.

"I don't believe you…" Riko hissed back. "I'm not worthless. My friends love me. They're probably outside trying to get me back. I can't give up!" Riko stood back up.

"That's the way to do it!" Another voice exclaimed. Riko turned around. Much to her surprise, another version of herself materialized. Cure Twilight.

"Cure...Twilight…"

"You're not worthless, and not everyone's a jerk! Your friends love you, and they're out there right now, fighting to get you back, just like you said!" Cure Twilight exclaimed, her green eyes twinkling with courage. "You've come this far because you never gave up hope! You never stopped believing you'd find people who would love you for you! Isn't that right?!"

Riko nodded in agreement. "Yes. But...I don't want to hurt them, like I'm doing now. How do I stop myself? How do I...get out of here?" Riko asked shyly, with a fist on her heart.

Cure Twilight put a hand on Riko's shoulder. "We'll figure a way out of this. We always have, haven't we?"

"No!" Little Riko shouted. "It's hopeless! We'll never get out! I like being inside! If we stay here, the world can't hurt us! Nobody can get mad at us! Isn't that what you've always wanted, Riko?! To be in your own world where nobody can get to you and yell at you and be mean to you?!"

"Well...sometimes yes, but…"

"Don't listen to her!" Cure Twilight protested boldly. "You've become much happier, stronger, and braver since you stepped out of your bubble! The world has so many beautiful things in it worth living for! You know this, right? You've known this all along! Isn't that why you kept living?"

Riko nodded. "Yes...Mom said I should never give up on the good the world has. There are lots of nice people here, and...my friends…"

"Exactly! Don't you want to keep on living? Seeing the world, making new friends, hanging out with your current ones, and saving the world from Zenjin?" Cure Twilight asked.

"Of course I do! I became Cure Twilight because I want to help people...just like my family and others have helped me!" Riko exclaimed.

Cure Twilight flashed a smile and a thumbs up. "That's the spirit, amigo!"

"But how do we get outta here?" Little Riko asked tearfully, clinging to Riko's shorts.

Riko hugged her younger self warmly but frightfully. "I have no idea. There has to be some way out!"

"There has to be! We've gotten out of something like this before!" Cure Twilight exclaimed.

"Only because Kyo-chan, Moonbeam, and Sunbeam dropped in and saved us," Riko clarified. But then she noticed something on the hologram projection. "Is that...Decebal and King Ghislain?"

* * *

_SHING!_ Decebal and Ghislain's swords clashed once more. This time, Ghislain managed to throw Decebal off. "Decebal...I'm sorry. I should have listened to your concerns…I should have been there when you needed me…" Ghislain hissed out remorsefully.

Decebal smirked. "Heh! At this point I don't care anymore! I only took in Zenjin just to use him for my plans and to see what it's like to suffer! Now I have solid proof that you're nothing but a big fat hypocrite of the highest order!" Decebal roared, charging at Ghislain again.

Again, Ghislain blocked his sword with his own. All of a sudden, a beam of light came out of Vespasian's horn as the alicorn galloped in between the green haired man and his beloved master. Vespasian whinnied harshly at the green haired man, as if to say, "Keep away from my master, you knave!"

Decebal grinded his teeth. "I'm done dealing with you!"

"Decebal! Wait!"

Ghislain tried to grab him, but Decebal teleported away before he could do anything. Ghislain slumped to the ground, his sullen face donning a mask of sadness. Why couldn't things have been different? Why did he put his trust in someone who never liked him and was just using him? So much of this could have been avoided had he been more careful. Perhaps...Decebal was right about him. Ghislain balled his fist and smacked the ground with it.

"Glinda...Felicie...I'm sorry...I'm not fit to be a king…" Ghislain mused to himself in a low whisper. A single tear streamed out from the corner of his left eye. Vespasian noticed. He walked over to his sad master and nuzzled him with his muzzle. "Thank you, Vespa. I don't know why you still love me after all I've done...or rather, all I've ignored."

At this point, the chaos died down, but not in a good way. The feline Corrupt Sentinel fell to the ground, unable to move. The Pretty Cure, fairies, and Malgorzata followed suit, too injured and exhausted to continue this arduous battle. Hornbeam couldn't even gather the energy to tend to everyone's injuries. The floor around them had many charred black spots on it from energy beams.

However, one person was still active. Kyoya, seeing the aftermath of the arduous battle, donned a courageous look. He very slowly walked past the tired girls, approaching the sleeping black cat. He was about to get closer until Lovebeam grabbed his leg. "What are you doing? Get back! It's dangerous!" Lovebeam pleaded, her voice hoarse from too much yelling earlier.

"Lovebeam. Do you have any sharp objects on you? Like a knife?" Kyoya asked, his face dead serious.

Lovebeam tilted her head to one side. _'Why in the world is he asking about that?!'_ Lovebeam yelled in her head, completely confused. But she knew from experience that whenever Kyoya asked about something, it was always for a solid reason. She touched her bow clip and a small pair of shiny, silver scissors appeared in her hands. "All I have are these scissors. I use them for cutting fabric," Lovebeam said, handing him the scissors.

"Thanks. I'll give these back when I'm done," Kyoya told her gratefully before returning to the cat.

"Pleeeease be careful with those!" Lovebeam pleaded, but Kyoya was so focused on the cat that he didn't seem to hear her.

Once he got close, he gripped the cat's fur and began slowly climbing on it. The cat's fur was short and not easy to grip, but Kyoya managed to keep an iron grip on every shred of fur he touched. Soon, he found himself right on top of the cat. He slowly crawled over to the cat's neck, and pulled the scissors out of his pocket. "Let's hope this works…" Kyoya mumbled as he raised the scissors high in the air, the sharp ends pointing right to the cat's neck.

Finally, he dredged the scissors down into the cat's neck. No blood came pouring out. In fact, nothing came out, but Kyoya beamed since the scissors managed to at least break a hole in the cat's neck. He smiled. "Riko! Are you in there?! Can you hear me?"

* * *

Riko heard that familiar voice. The voice of the first friend she made in Hikaribashi. "Kyo-chan?!"

"_Riko! It's me, Kyoya! I know you're in there! Answer me!"_ Kyoya's voice seemed to echo all around the area. But Riko heard it loud and clear, and her heart became encased in a warm and loving glow just from hearing it.

"Kyo-chaaaaaan! I'm in heeeeeere! I can hear yoooouuuu!" Riko called out.

"It doesn't seem like he can hear you," Cure Twilight said, gripping the shawl around her waist.

"It's not real!" Little Riko shouted. "It's fake! It's a trick to take you out of your world so everyone can laugh at you and bully you and hate you just like before!"

"No!" Riko protested. "That's Kyo-chan's voice! He would never abandon me or hate me!" Riko very clearly remembered the incident where he, Sunbeam, and Moonbeam saved her from her own despair, Zenjin's spell, and her corrupted Light Bringer. In a way, Riko was glad she didn't bring her Light Bringer today. But she knew Kyoya would go above and beyond for her. He didn't have to, but he did. And he would, just like right now.

"Cure Twilight! Can you use the wings on your shoes to take us up there?" Riko asked.

With a sad look on her face, Cure Twilight shook her head. "Riko. I'm not real. I'm you, but I'm just a figment of your imagination right now. I can't use my powers."

"Uuuuugh! There has to be something we can do to get out! I don't wanna be stuck here forever! My friends are out there waiting for me!" Riko exclaimed, perturbed by her inability to do anything.

"You're better off staying here anyway. Here, you're never alone. You can be here and do whatever you want, and nobody will hate you and bully you," Little Riko said in a grim, indifferent, almost robotic voice. "The world outside is cruel. You're not safe out there. Stay here in yourself. You'll be much happier that way. Nobody will ever understand you anyway."

That was what Riko used to think, so many years ago. Riko always wanted to make friends, but nobody she knew in Yokosuka liked the things she did. Nobody knew about Moomins, and most people were put off by her odd behaviors such as flapping her hands, crying when she gets yelled at, not wearing clothes kids her age wear, not liking makeup or boys or fashion or beautifying herself, and other things. For a while back then, Riko did give up. She did think she would be happier if she just stayed away from the outside world. She gave up one day, convinced that she would never find friends her own age.

But then her parents made the decision to move.

(flashback)

"_Riko? Can I talk to you for a moment?" Saki came into the living room as Riko was watching a DVD of Heartcatch Pretty Cure. Riko put the episode on pause with the remote and turned to face her mother. This took place in late February, about a week before Riko's school year ends._

"_Yeah? What's up?" Riko asked curiously._

"_I have something I want to tell you," Saki began. "You see, over the past few months, your father and I have been trying to find a new job. A job outside of Yokosuka. But just recently, I got a call from a casino in a place called Hikaribashi. They want me to work for them, and I accepted their offer! I'll make a lot more money than ever before. But there's something else, too, Riko."_

_Riko found herself beaming. Her mother got a new job? She'll make more money? Riko smiled, happy for her mother, as she was starting to get tired of hearing her complain about how bad her current job has gotten and how much less money she had been getting. "Are we...going to live somewhere else?" Riko asked._

_Saki's eyes widened a bit, but she kept going. "Yes. When your school year is over, we'll be moving to a place called Hikaribashi. It's very far away, but your father and I have been there once, and it's a very cute little place. It has lots of trees, lots of parks we can play in, lots of trails we can walk on, and the schools over there are a lot better," Saki explained._

_Normally, when kids hear they're going to move, they'd be sad and complain about how they'll lose their friends and their livelihoods. But for Riko, who has been friendless for most of her life, getting away from this dinky town was a dream come true. "Yaaaaay! We can FINALLY get away from this bad town forever!" Riko cheered and jumped all around the living room before leaping on her mother and wrapping her skinny little arms around her neck. Saki almost fell over, but she managed to regain her balance._

_Even Saki couldn't help but be surprised. She expected a very different reaction from Riko. But she found herself happy for her daughter. She stroke her daughter's back gently before prying the happy little girl off of herself. "We bought a new house recently. I think you'll like it. It's much bigger and nicer than this one."_

"_Will I make friends over there? Will nobody bully me?" Riko asked._

_Saki put both hands on Riko's shoulders. "I don't know about bullies, as they're always around. But the school at Hikaribashi is very good. We talked to some teachers over there, and they said they'd love to meet you in person. It's also more diverse than the school here, so who knows? Maybe you will make some friends. But we'll see. I just...want you to be happy, Riko," Some tears came out of Saki's eyes, but she wasn't crying._

_But Riko thought she was. "Why are you crying?"_

"_Oh! I am?" Saki wiped some tears off of her cheeks with her hand. "How did this happen? Sorry about that. But we'll start packing up soon. It's going to be a very long ride."_

"_How long?"_

"_About six hours from here."_

"_That's okay! I'll bring all my books and music and manga and anime and plushies and everything!"_

_Saki chuckled. "I'm sure you will. I'll get dinner ready soon."_

_Riko went back to the living room and resumed her DVD. Afterward, she found her mind swimming in new, happy thoughts. A new house! A new home! A bigger room! A new school! Potential new friends! A brand new city with lots of trees and parks! Riko wished they could go there right now so she wouldn't have to put up with that annoying kid singing the Barney song at her for the millionth time._

(end flashback)

"_Riko. I know you can hear me. We're not giving up on you. We'll save you or die trying,"_ Kyoya said from above.

"No," Riko said.

"What?" Little Riko found herself confused.

"I don't want to hide from everyone. Coming to Hikaribashi was the best thing that ever happened to me. I'm happy we moved here!" Riko told her with a hand on her own chest. "If my parents hadn't moved here...I wouldn't have made all the friends I made here!" Images of Kyoya, Anzu, Hotaru, Marina, Umi, Sorane, Takayuki, Chinami, and Fukiko all flashed through her mind with smiles on all of their faces. "I'm so much happier now than I ever was back at Yokosuka or when I was in my own world!"

Cure Twilight put a hand on her shoulder, beaming. "That's right. Your world got bigger, you've moved on from your past, you've gotten braver, and you're able to be happy with yourself," Cure Twilight said.

"Better yet...I became you…" Riko told her.

Cure Twilight shook her head. "No. I am you. Just...a magical girl version of you. That's all. But we're one person, you, me, and Little Riko here," She took Riko's hand. "Your desire to keep living despite everything that happened to you gave birth to me...a brand new you. There's still so much living to do. You could have taken your own life and gave up on the world. But you didn't, and that's what I love about you...and what you should love about yourself. You want to wake up every day and keep living, doing what you love, with the people you love, seeing new things. There are just as many good people out there as there are bad people, and your friends are out there, and they love you for you! And your parents and siblings worked hard to get you where you are today. If they hadn't helped out...you wouldn't have become the person you are today."

Riko knew the last two parts for sure. The warm glow in her heart shined even brighter. "I know...and I want to keep going. In life, I mean. Umi-chan gave her life to save me. I can't let her sacrifice be for nothing. Will you...still be there?"

"Of course! I'm you, after all!" Cure Twilight said with a beaming smile.

"What about me?"

Riko and Cure Twilight turned to look at Little Riko, whose face is completely drowning in tears. "If you go...you'll leave me all alone and not love me anymore. I don't wanna be all alone!" She choked out in a sad, broken voice.

Riko kneeled down and extended her hand out to the girl. "Then come with me."

"Huh?"

"There's no way I'd leave you here. You're me, aren't you? It's true, I do want to change...but I still need you. You want to live life and be happy too, right?" Riko asked with a smile.

Little Riko said nothing, but the tears finally stopped flowing. The warm glow that encased Riko's heart soon enveloped Little Riko's heart. She didn't think she'd like it. But she smiled brightly, so bright that Riko thought she may need sunglasses just to stare at it. Little Riko clasped Riko's big hand with her small, chubby one. Cure Twilight and Little Riko both turned into shining purple lights and trapped Riko inside. Soon, Riko appeared, but as Cure Twilight instead.

"I am the light that will brighten up your world, Cure Twilight!"

* * *

The cat didn't wake up one bit, but Kyoya kept talking and clinging to the scissors dredged in its neck. Cure Dusk finally woke up, having rested somewhat from the tiring battle. She rubbed her eyes to adjust them to her surroundings, but once it became clear, she saw Kyoya on the cat's back. She stood up and walked over to the fallen cat.

"Kyoya! What are you doing!? Get off of there!" Cure Dusk yelped.

"Shhh! I'm trying to get through to Riko!" Kyoya hissed.

"What?"

"You heard me. You gonna help me out or what?"

"We've been fighting this thing all night, and nothing we've done works!"

"So?! I know she can hear me, and I'm not giving up on her! Besides...don't you have something you want to say to her?"

Cure Dusk knew what he meant. He had a good point. She clutched the shawl around her waist. _'He's right. I shouldn't give up. Not on my friends...'_ The memories of all the times Riko was nice to her flashed through her mind...and she bit her lip at the memory of yelling at her on the bleachers yesterday. She needed to let Riko know how sorry she was. She couldn't let their friendship end. Not like this. She climbed up the cat.

"Riko! Can you hear me?! It's Marina! Look, I'm sorry about the mean things I said to you yesterday! I should have been more sensitive and understanding! I'm sorry I can't understand you for the life of me, but I don't care anymore! You're still my friend, and I want to keep it that way!" Marina yelled.

Marina's yelling woke everyone else up. They couldn't move, but they could figure out what Kyoya and Cure Dusk were doing. Hornbeam managed to find the energy to pull out some gauze and tend to Starlight's wounds. Crossbeam did the same with Cure Dawn. Moonbeam and Sunbeam used their energy to fly over to Kyoya and Cure Dusk.

"Riko-chan! Please come back! You're our friend!" Moonbeam pleaded.

"We still have hanging out to do!" Sunbeam added.

What they didn't know was that Zenjin suddenly teleported into the dimension right then and there. He was quite a distance away, and didn't seem to realize what was going on. "Ugh...I'm so hungry…" Zenjin moaned, flying with his eyes closed. But when he came close to his fortress, he stopped and found himself aghast.

His castle was no longer the esteemed home he constructed from scratch. Instead, it was now a big pile of rubble, and it was being invaded by the Pretty Cure. Not only that, the Corrupt Sentinel he created from Riko has fallen.

And Kyoya is on its back.

* * *

"Twilight Sparkle!" Cure Twilight threw her glowing boomerang, hoping it would hit something or make a portal appear so she can leap out of it. But it didn't hit anything, and it returned to its owner. "Alright then...Twilight Serenade!" She fired a beam of light. It just kept going, hitting absolutely nothing. "Next up! Twilight Masquerade!" Twilight shot many bubbles of purple light all around herself. Again, that didn't work. She was getting irritated. "Uuuuuugh! Doesn't ANYTHING work?! I wanna go back to my friends and family, for cryin' out loud!" Cure Twilight screamed. At least here, she doesn't have to worry about people staring at her or telling her it's inappropriate or unsightly.

But then a holographic projection appeared. This time, it showed Kyoya looking down at her with a sad smile on his face, still clinging to the scissors dredged in the cat's neck.

"Kyo-chan!" Riko shouted. But her eyes widened when she saw something coming up behind him.

Someone she knew would kill him without mercy.

* * *

"Dusk Medley!" Cure Dusk shot some flaming musical notes at Zenjin, but he deflected them all as soon as he swooped in. He mercilessly grabbed her by the neck and threw her away like she was a rag doll. Cure Skylight managed to catch her.

"Oh, no you don't!" Sunbeam shouted as she, Moonbeam, Starbeam, Lovebeam, and Crossbeam all stormed in to at least try and subdue Zenjin. But like usual, he swiped at them, releasing a large, black energy, sending them flying. Crossbeam managed to catch Starbeam and Moonbeam while Dawn caught Sunbeam.

Kyoya didn't even see him coming, he was too focused on getting through to Riko. But he felt something hard lock onto his neck and press on it very hard, making him lose air. He gasped for air, but none came inside. His throat was sealed shut by a cruel hand.

"I think it's time I finally do away with you once and for all, you mockery of my existence!" Zenjin sneered, his cracking voice dripping with malice.

Kyoya was able to get one thing out before Zenjin tried to suffocate him. "RIKO!"

* * *

She had to get out. She needed to get out. No, she wanted to get out. The whole world was waiting for her out there. Her friends, her family, new sights to see, and everything else.

She couldn't stay here.

The cat hissed so loud, everyone covered their ears except Zenjin. The cat began glowing in a blinding purple light. Zenjin had to let go of Kyoya in order to use both arms to cover his face with them. Then, something popped right out of the cat's corpse. Something glowing bright purple. Breath came into Kyoya's throat, and he marveled at being able to breathe again. But everyone else marveled at something else.

Cure Twilight drove her fist into a breathless Zenjin's stomach.

It was surely a sight to behold.

"You mess with my friends, you mess with me!"

"TWILIGHT!" Everyone shouted with relief in their exhausted voices.

Cure Twilight, with new resolve and zeal, took on a fighting stance. Zenjin did as well. "Aren't you supposed to be dead by now?! Why aren't you dead?! You've been Human Trash all night!"

Zenjin charged at the purple cat girl with a punch, but Cure Twilight grabbed his arm and swung him on the floor. "Sorry, bub! I got myself out! I'm GOING to live my life the way I want to, with my friends and family, no matter how bad things get! _And you're not going to take them away from me or take me away from them!_"

She flung her arms in the air, with both hands glowing in rainbow colored spheres of light. An aurora appeared in the starry sky of Zenjin's dimension. Everyone looked up with confused but awestruck eyes. "What the-?!"

"Twilight Aurora!" The aurora in the sky flashed, and huge streaks of rainbow colored lights fell from the sky like meteors, all falling right toward Zenjin. He swung his arms out, and a black dome appeared, shielding him from the attack. When the attack finally subsided, black energy exploded outward.

"Twi!" Cure Dawn was quick to act, flinging her arm and making her own shield around her friends.

"The time limit...doesn't work on Pretty Cure?!" Starbeam choked out.

"This is the first time this has ever happened," Malgorzata said as she struggled to stand on her feet. Skylight extended one of her wings for support. Malgorzata gripped it and managed to stand up just fine. Celestia nuzzled her.

The smoke faded, and Zenjin came out breathing heavily, the anger in his eyes blazing uncontrollably. "Why…? Why do you get in my way?!" Zenjin roared. "Everything bad that's happened to me is your fault!" He pointed at Malgorzata. Celestia galloped in front of Malgorzata and whinnied harshly, as if to say, "Don't talk like that to my master!"

"Zenjin! You can't do this anymore! You need to stop or more people will die! I understand that you're hurting, and I'm sorry I didn't notice anything! I'm sorry we put Decebal in charge of you. That was foolish of us. But you didn't have to resort to this! You can't cling to your sadness and hatred forever! I'm sorry we made you suffer-" Malgorzata pleaded.

"NO YOU'RE NOT!" Zenjin swung his arm, but no energy came out. Cure Twilight covered her ears when he yelled. She used her tail to help Kyoya stand up. "You don't know ANYTHING about the suffering I've endured for eight years straight! I've been starved, beaten, degraded, mocked, locked away, urinated on, pooped on-!"

Cure Dawn recoiled with disgust. "Okay, EWW! TMI!"

"All the better! Not only that, I've been tricked and used by people who only wanted me to satisfy their own inflated egos and discarded like trash! Do you live on trying to tell me my place in this world is to be a weakling who will only know eternal suffering and sadness?! Is that what you're trying to tell me?!"

"No!" Malgorzata pleaded. "That's not true!"

"I will NOT be a weakling! I am Zenjin! I am strong, powerful, merciless! I have powers that not even God himself possesses! You will NOT change me!" Zenjin roared, lunging at Kyoya, grabbing him once again. Kyoya grabbed a good chunk of his hair and yanked it right off in retaliation.

"Aerial Ace!" Skylight lunged at Zenjin again, ramming him around so hard he was forced to release Kyoya once again. He put the hair strands he pulled off in his pocket before hugging Riko like he hadn't seen her in a decade.

"Riko! I'm so glad you're back!" Kyoya exclaimed tearfully, nuzzling Riko's cheek.

Riko smiled warmly and hugged him back. "Thanks for...being there for me."

Cure Starlight found herself standing up. "Zenjin. We're sorry about what you went through. But...don't think you're the only one who suffers here," She told him. "All human beings suffer. Some are weak, some are strong, some change during their lifespan. We all endure varying levels of hardship. But...just because you suffer, you can't base your whole life around it."

Skylight stood next to her, with a hand in Starlight's. "We humans survive and fight the sadness because we want to find the good the world has to offer. We keep fighting until we find it."

"After all…" Cure Dawn added. "It's because we humans have sadness...that we cherish happiness. Sometimes, even the tiniest light in the darkness is like heaven. We can't turn our back on it, and we fight to grasp it, no matter what it takes."

Malgorzata's eyes widened upon seeing the girls stand together with such noble, courageous looks in their eyes. Those dignified stances, the injuries on their bodies, the lights in their hearts shining like the sun. She had seen those before, the day Youko and Hinata left on their journey to their old home planet.

"_Malgorzata...we thank you for helping us when we needed you. It's because of you that we got to live,"_ Youko had said.

"_We'll get through this! I'm sure we will! If we can get through horrible disasters, then we can get through this, too! We'll be the Earth's lights of hope!"_ Hinata had shouted to the world, holding her fist out proudly like she was cheering for a baseball team to win the nationals.

"I...I finally understand now…" Malgorzata mused to herself. Her hands trembled and her eyesight blurred and warmed with tears, but she found herself smiling warmly. "The final requirement for a girl to become Pretty Cure...is her desire to live, to love, to protect, to shine brightly, triumphing over all hardship and adversity, no matter how strong the despair is. That's...what makes the girls shine…"

"I should have killed you when I had the chance! You're gonna DIIIE!" Zenjin lunged at the girls, but Cures Twilight and Starlight all held him off with Twilight's claws and Starlight's naginata.

Ghislain sat up and drew his sword. "Zenjin. This must stop."

With a roar, Zenjin teleported away. The battle ended.

"Rikoooooo!" A tearful Cure Dusk ran over to Cure Twilight and trapped her in a tight hug. "I'm so sorry!"

"For...what?"

"If I hadn't been so stupid and insensitive yesterday, you wouldn't have been turned into a CS! None of this would have happened! I'm sorry I can't understand you for the life of me, but I want to! I really do! I want us to keep being friends! I should have been more sensitive!" Cure Dusk cried into Twilight's shoulder quite tearfully.

Riko couldn't believe it. This was Marina? This crying, blubbering, vulnerable girl is the sullen, strong, brave, and kick-butt Marina who never shows mercy to any of her enemies in battle? She never saw this side of her before. But the warm glow in her heart persisted. She stroke Marina's back gently. "It's okay."

Soon, the fairies and the rest of the girls crowded all around Riko, trapping her in hugs. Anzu just put an arm around Riko's shoulder. "Glad to have you back, Riko."

"You scared us back there! We didn't think we'd save you!" Moonbeam cried, nuzzling Riko's cheeks tearfully, causing Riko to laugh a little.

"Sorry. It was kinda my fault. I wanted to go after Decebal but I battled with Zenjin and lost. He stuck his hand in my Soul Portal and turned me into...y'know," Riko explained sheepishly, her face turning red.

"Come on! We need to get home! Our moms and dads are probably worried sick!" Skylight exclaimed.

"Good thing. I need to catch some much needed Z's," Anzu said with a hand on her head.

"I'll send a search party out to look for Zenjin. He cannot be allowed to continue his reign of terror," Ghislain said as he hopped on Vespasian's back.

The kids and fairies teleported back to Earth.

* * *

When the kids arrived on Earth, they were greeted with varying reactions from their parents. Arinao, Saki, Kayoko, Sojiro, Kyouichi, and Takashi were just too happy to be reunited with their kids. Hatoko, on the other hand, went off on Marina, lecturing her and shouting at her. "Do you have any idea how worried I was?! I can't believe you just ran off without telling me! I trusted you, Marina! You are grounded for two weeks, and I'm not going to let you go out there and put yourself in mortal danger!"

She had good reason to be worried, but Marina wished she'd quit yelling, as Riko was covering her ears. Later, the kids all went to bed, sleeping the day away. Yes, it was a school day, but at this point, their parents didn't expect them to go to school. They were tired, up all night, and needed some sleep.

After school the next day, the girls met at the park. The fairies introduced Riko to their parents, Crossbeam and Hornbeam. "So...what happens now?" Riko asked.

"All I know is Mom pretty much wants to lock me in the house forever. I had to get on my knees and beg just to convince her to let me meet with you guys right now," Marina complained.

"As of now, Ghislain's party is searching high and low, on Earth and Rozaniela, for Zenjin and Decebal. So far, they've come up empty," Hornbeam said.

"Riko-chan. We thank you for taking care of our beloved daughters for so long. We're sorry you had to get involved in this mess, but we are truly grateful," Crossbeam told her politely, with a bow to go with it.

"No no! It's no big deal! I'm just sorry I caused all this trouble!" Riko exclaimed sheepishly.

"Oh, come on! Take the compliment for once! Quit being so modest!" Sunbeam chirped.

"We still don't understand why Zenjin took the Energia," Kyoya said.

"We do know Decebal took in Zenjin just so he could make him take it," Sorane added.

"And that the countdown on Corrupt Sentinels doesn't apply to Pretty Cure for some reason," Hotaru said.

"Out for revenge. I know it," Anzu retorted with some slight snark in her voice.

"At this point, I'm just happy to be with Mom and Dad again!" Lovebeam chirped, clasping the ears of both her parents.

"Really, Lovebeam. You needn't be so clingy," Starbeam told her. Lovebeam stuck her tongue out at her.

"I think I have an idea of why the time limit didn't take Riko's life," Hornbeam said. "I was talking with the Queen, and she made a discovery in the archives. The Heart Lighters and Light Bringers are all made from the Energia's energy, so if someone has the Heart Lighter on their person or is already a Pretty Cure, the time limit doesn't apply, because the person using the Energia is making contact with items made from the Energia, and their energies repel each other, causing the rules associated with Corrupt Sentinel making to become void. It's like how magnets repel each other."

"That makes no sense," Kyoya said.

"It does to me!" Riko added.

Everyone found themselves laughing, happy that the team is complete. Well, it would be, but they wouldn't forget about their other teammate.

* * *

Zenjin sat underneath a tree, outside a remote parking lot. He pulled a rock out of some grass and threw it at someone's car. The rock bounced off the windshield, leaving a big crack on it before falling and rolling on the concrete. Zenjin spat at the grass. "I can't believe those idiots trashed my house."

All of a sudden, a small, white rectangular envelope fell on Zenjin's lap. He sat up and looked through them for a bit before looking up. He recoiled in disgust upon seeing the familiar green hair and Shakespearian attire.

"Here to mock me again?"

"No. A little gift from me just for you. It's the information you want."

Zenjin looked down at the pictures, then at Decebal. At the pictures again, then at Decebal. "Seriously?"

"You really are hopeless without me. Now you know where she is and what she looks like. Just go and do whatever you want with her. When you're done, I'm still going to take the Energia from you," Decebal told him with a glare before teleporting.

Zenjin found himself speechless at first. Despite Decebal using him for his own ends, he still cared enough to give him what he wanted. Zenjin held the pictures to his chest and smiled. "Thanks, Decebal."

Finally, he could go and do what he had always dreamed of.


	47. Bonus 5: Riko's Memories

Being reworked


	48. Bonus 6: Marina's Memories

Your name is Marina Asagi and for a while, you didn't think you had a father.

You knew you had one, but he was hardly ever home. He was always on TV, at press conferences, with cameras flashing all around him, smiling and talking with big words you don't understand. Your mother says he works hard so we can provide us with money, food, and shelter. But you see classmates hanging out with their dads a lot. Why doesn't he come home and hang out with them like all dads do? You wish you could show him the art projects you did in school, the new guitar your mom bought for you, and your report cards. You got A's and B's in everything! Not only that, you wish you could go to concerts with him, go fishing with him, go to the local ice cream shop with him, have him help you with your homework, all the things your classmates do with their dads. There were times when he did come home, but whenever you'd ask him to do something, he would always say, "We'll see," "Not now. I'm tired and need some rest," "No, Marina. I have a meeting to go to."

You wonder if he's married to his job and cares more about it than you.

But one day, you discovered that he would never come back home.

You saw it on TV. Something about Asagi Shouji getting arrested. You know what arrested means. To arrest someone is to throw them in jail. Your father's in jail now? For what? Don't criminals go there? People who rob banks, hurt people, kill people, do drugs? The TV said grand embezzlement, but you don't know what that means. You look it up in a big dictionary.

**Embezzlement: when money that is entrusted to someone is stolen.**

**Example: The treasurer of the company embezzled a million dollars.**

Your dad stole money? From who? You wish you knew. But at this point, you don't care. You just want to watch the next episode of Fresh Pretty Cure.

But as the months went by, you began noticing something. Your father's case is all over the news, with constant new developments. You wish it'd stop already. You're sick of hearing about your father being in jail! All you want to do is start a new school year, make friends, and get on with your life. But there was one problem. One big problem: nobody wanted to be friends with you after that.

You first noticed this when you were nine years old. When school started, you couldn't wait to make friends, just like you did when you were younger. You couldn't wait to find BFFs to gossip with and hang out with and do whatever it is the grown up kids do. But when you actually try to talk to kids at recess, they stay away from you. They run away when you approach them, and ignore you like you don't exist. You don't get it. You try to be yourself: cheerful, friendly, and bouncy, but they still don't respond to you. You're sad and talk to your mother about it. She says everything'll be fine. Just give it time. You'll find friends eventually. Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months, and months became the entire school year. No friends at all. Oh well. Everything will be better in fifth grade.

Only it would be the opposite.

At ten years old, you find yourself getting picked on by some rowdy boys. Your mother told you to stand up for yourself when someone picks on you, and it's exactly what you do. But they don't stop. They yell at you, call you names, and even throw stuff at you like rocks, sticks, pencils, half eaten sandwiches, dirt, sand, patches of mud, etc. They made absolutely no attempt to hide their contempt toward you.

You don't get it. What did you do to them that was so bad? You didn't do anything wrong! At first, you try to ignore them and attempt to befriend some of the girls, but instead of just ignoring you like in fourth grade, they actually respond. But not in nice ways. They say, "Go away, you freak!" "Yeah! We don't like girls like you!" "Buzz off, you idiot!" "Go rob a bank, since that's what you and your family are good at!" "Stay away! We don't like bad girls like you!"

After a while, you start to realize that their insults have something in common. They say you're bad. They mention your family. They say you're bad just like your dad, only you don't know your dad. You just know that he's in prison. They act like you're some criminal or something, like the ones the police catch. Criminals do bad things, like rob banks, break into people's homes, kill people, kidnap little kids, and all those bad things! You don't do that stuff! It's wrong to do that stuff! Why do they say you will? They don't know you! Why are they acting like you're the bad one? Why do they do bad things to you and then tell the teacher you did bad stuff to them? She never believes them, of course, and tells them that you should never judge people based on preconceived notions. You don't know what that means. But even though she's nice to you, the kids still hate you. You've tried being nice. It hasn't worked.

Finally, you tearfully pop the question. "Why does everyone say I'm bad?"

"Because you are, duh!" One kid shouts.

"Yeah! It runs in your family!" Another kid added.

After meandering through the rest of the school day bawling your eyes out, you come home and ask your mother about your father and what he did. She looked sad when you asked her this, but she reluctantly told you. As it turns out, Shouji stole money not just from big companies, but from people in the neighborhood, causing them to become completely poor, unable to even so much as buy food for their starving children. Some have even died from starvation.

You decide that you'll never be like him, that you'll be the best person you can be, just like your mother wishes. You know you're not a criminal, and you won't grow up to be one either. So what if you're some corrupt politician's daughter? It's not like you want to be his kid, and it's not like you'll be like him either.

You finally have the guts to tell your classmates all of this, but they don't listen. They ignore you and continue to pick on you despite trying your gosh darn hardest to convince them they're wrong in their belief that you'll be like Shouji. But they don't listen. They still believe you're bad.

Nothing you've done is ever going to change anything.

Your name is Marina Asagi, and you give up.

You gave up the minute that crazy woman slashed your face with a really sharp and dirty garden trowel, yelling something about you ruining everything and stealing her hard earned money. Even though you're okay, the scar will never heal, both the one on your cheek and the ones on your heart.

Soon, you're eleven years old and you find yourself angry all the time. Angry at those kids, angry at the whole world, angry at...well, just about everything. You find yourself doing things you never thought you'd ever do: picking on other kids like they picked on you. You yelled, you screamed, you called people names, you kicked stuff around, broke things (only at home), you got into fights (punching, kicking, biting, spitting, etc.) with anyone who crossed you in any way, snapped at your teachers, everything. You even got into the habit of picking on kids who didn't do anything to you, like that red haired kid in the wheelchair who's always minding his own business. What did he do to deserve your hatred? You don't know.

Kids hate you even more now, but you don't care anymore. You're sick of being nice. You're sick of trying to pursue a lost cause. If they say you're a villain, then fine. Be the villain then! It's what they expect of you, so you might as well give them what they want! But you don't enjoy it one bit. You don't like being the villain. Your mother is constantly grounding you and disciplining you about it, but she doesn't understand what you've been through. You're sad that she has to do this at all, and you're sad that she's sad, but what can you do? You can't do anything about the pain your father's crimes have caused you and your family, so why bother? It's hopeless, you tell her. Nothing you've ever done will ever convince these people you're not Shouji Asagi. They'll always remind you of his crimes and act like you'll be his clone no matter what. What else is there to do? It's all over, you think. Nothing will ever change, no matter what.

Or so you thought.

You're twelve years old, in the 7th grade. A new girl arrives. Her name is Riko Tasogare, and you're irked by how stiff she looks and how she looks like a boy with that haircut of hers. You ask her if a cat's got her tongue or if she's too stupid to talk. After that, at recess, you knock the red haired boy out of his wheelchair and yell at him, only to get yelled at by the new girl. You yell back, but you get caught and sent to the principal's office. You decide you hate her for her meddlesome goody-goody attitude, and that she should pay for getting in your way. You're surprised at how malicious you've become. Were you always such a detestable person? Is this the person you will become?

You're convinced that you will...until the day she, as Cure Twilight, saved you from some white haired kid's wrath. She saved you, but everyone else treated her like she was a villain all because she destroyed some houses by accident. You call them out on this, and you're surprised at how good it made you feel. Not only that, they listened to you for once. Nobody ever did that before.

The gravity of what you've done to those you victimized hits you, and you find yourself completely overcome with remorse. You've become someone you didn't want to be. You apologize to Kyoya and Riko for picking on them. But then you notice something else. Riko keeps on approaching you, wanting you to be her friend. You're surprised. Nobody's ever treated you like a human being before. But you accept her kind offers and at least try to improve yourself for the better.

Best decision you ever made. You're friends with Riko now. Not only that, you have a whole group of friends. Anzu, Kyoya, Chinami, Fukiko...best of all, you're a Pretty Cure now! A real superhero with magical powers! You know things are looking up now. No longer do you want to be a villain like most people expect. You resolve to become a good person, the person you used to be before the fourth grade, fighting crime and helping people.

Your name is Marina Asagi, and you're only yourself, not the person you're spawned from. You want to set a good example and make a difference in the world, and with your friends by your side, you know you'll enjoy it.


	49. Zenjin's Motive Is Revealed!

Being reworked


	50. A Showdown In Another Dimension!

Being reworked


	51. Zenjin VS Decebal!

_**ATTENTION: TRIGGER WARNING FOR VIOLENCE**_

* * *

Chapter 45: A Heartwrenching Showdown! Zenjin VS Decebal!

"Starlight Shower!"

"Mandarin Dusk Inferno!"

"Twilight Aurora!"

"Dawn Burst!"

"Skylight Phoenix!"

The battle with Zenjin continued, but as usual, none of their attacks did any damage to the silver haired boy whatsoever. The red sphere grew steadily larger, much to the surprise of Malgorzata, Ghislain, Crossbeam, and Hornbeam. The screaming inside it finally ceased. At one point, Celestia and Vespasian both charged at Zenjin, with their pearl like horns ready to go right through him. Unfortunately, Zenjin grabbed both horns and threw the winged horses off the layer like they were rag dolls.

Both alicorns extended their wings and flew back onto the layer, but Zenjin shot two black rays of light at them. As soon as they made contact with their wings, the alicorns whinnied with agony. Their wings were unable to carry them anymore, and the two winged horses fell to the layer. "Celestia! Vespasian!" Malgorzata ran over to her fallen friends. Vespasian stammered on his front hooves, but slumped right back down.

Hornbeam took a look at Vespasian's wing first. Then he went to look at Celestia's wing. It didn't look good. "Vespasian's wing is okay, but Celestia's is very clearly broken," Hornbeam said as he tried to extend Celestia's injured wing. She whinnied in pain and almost smacked him with said wing. "Whoa! Sorry, girl!"

Malgorzata balled her fists. "Hornbeam and I will take them back to Rozaniela," She said to Ghislain with a solemn look on her face. "You and Crossbeam help the girls out. I'll see you later," With that, she, Hornbeam, and the alicorns teleported away.

"Pheh! Why do you care so much about those lame horses?! They're useless!" Zenjin sneered maliciously.

Ghislain drew out his blade and pointed it at Zenjin. "You have no right to degrade our steeds like that!"

"I never did like you!" Zenjin's hand glowed in an eerie black light. Crossbeam got a crowbar out and readied it, floating firmly in front of Ghislain like a knight protecting its king. But something hit Zenjin's forehead right then and there. "OW!"

A small rock bounced on the layer. It wasn't large, nor did it leave any permanent marks, but it definitely hurt, and Zenjin found himself falling to his knees in pain, covering the injured area with his hand. Crossbeam turned toward a bigger rock and noticed Kyoya with a slingshot behind it. He flashed a smile and a thumb's up.

That gave her an idea. "Girls! This is your chance!" Crossbeam shouted to the Pretty Cure girls.

"Right!" Cure Twilight exclaimed.

The girls readied themselves for their finishing move. "Bless us with your shine, holy light! Pretty Cure Shining...Light!" The blinding light from the fairies and the girls actually managed to envelop Zenjin. For a moment, the girls and the fairies became elated. Had they finally defeated Zenjin at last?

"YOU WILL NOT DEFEAT MEEEEE!" Sad to say, Zenjin broke through their light with an explosion of black energy. Cure Twilight managed to wrap her tail around the rock that Kyoya and Lovebeam are hiding behind, but Sunbeam, Starbeam, Moonbeam, Dusk, Dawn, Starlight, and Skylight were all blown away, falling into the black abyss.

"NOO!" Twilight ran to the edge. "Girls?! Fairies?! Can you hear me?!" She shouted hysterically, her voice and eyes completely drowning in a sea of worry. It was bad enough losing Takayuki and Umi. If she lost the rest of her friends...she didn't even want to think about it. _'They can't be dead! They just can't be! This new battle field has a bunch of floors! Maybe they fell on one!'_ She reasoned before activating the wings on her shoes. "Hang on! I'll-"

She wanted to go down after them, but something grabbed her by the neck and threw her across the layer. Twilight activated her claws and used them to claw at the floor. Thankfully, that stopped her from falling off the edge. When she looked up, she saw Zenjin looming over her with a self-made knife in his hand. "You're mine, kitty cat!"

"RIKO! GET OUT OF THE WAY!" Kyoya roared from behind the rock.

Before Zenjin could lunge the knife down, a flash of pink smacked him across the face, sending him rolling off the edge of the layer, falling right down. The flash of pink went right down with him. They fell down at least ten whole floors before finally stopping on the eleventh. When Zenjin got back on his feet, he found himself face to face with an enraged Lovebeam.

"You DO NOT mess with MY friends, you dolt!" Lovebeam roared valiantly before charging at Zenjin once again. She flew so fast that she actually managed to land some hits on him, making him fall on his rear. "Lovebeam Tornado!" Lovebeam spun around like a tornado, with her ears resembling a propeller. Once she turned herself into a pink tornado, she threw herself right at Zenjin once again.

"Don't mess with me, you pink trash!" Zenjin howled as he encased his hand in a black light again.

Before Lovebeam could attack him again, a large, green vine of thorns suddenly shot up from the layer before it coiled right around one of her ears. "Ow!" The thorns were so large and so sharp, they actually penetrated Lovebeam's skin. More vines shot up from the ground, pinning the pink fairy to the ground. She tried to pull herself out, but every time she so much as moved, thorns would either dig into her frail skin or leave red marks on her ear. "Let me go, you bully!"

"Now you'll stay out of my way, you trash. Have a horrible death, pinkie," Zenjin sneered before flying back toward the top layer, leaving Lovebeam alone and trapped in a pile of thorn vines.

Despite the horrible pain her right ear is enduring, Lovebeam grabbed the vine and tried to untangle it from her ear. She tried and tried, but every time she moved said vine, the thorns dug deeper into her skin. She didn't cry out despite the agonizing pain. She tried to move the vine and rip it off, but not only were the vines hard, they just wouldn't budge.

"Helloooooo?! Can anyone hear meeeeeee?!" Cure Twilight shouted from the top layer.

Lovebeam heard it loud and clear. "Twiliiiiiiight! I'm down heeeeeere!" Lovebeam shouted with all her strength.

"Lovebeam?! Is that you?! Are you okay?!"

"I'm fine! Don't worry about me! Just stop Zenjiiiiiin!" Lovebeam shouted back, hoping to appease Cure Twilight's worries a little bit.

"I'll do the best I caaaaan-OW!"

Zenjin smacked her across the back from behind before she could finish that sentence. But Twilight was quick to recover and attempted to land some punches on him. As usual, he evaded them all. He fired some beams at her, but Twilight did a few back flips to dodge them all before flying in the air with the wings on her shoes. She attempted to drop kick him, but he grabbed her foot and threw her across the layer. He charged at her once again, but before Twilight could get back up, Crossbeam swooped down on the scene and deflected Zenjin's punch with her crowbar. It was so hard, Zenjin had to take a few steps back.

"Get out of my way, you trash!" Zenjin roared angrily. Cure Twilight didn't like how bloodshot his eyes became. His eyes were so red they looked like they were going to bleed.

"You hurt my children in ways you refuse to acknowledge! You're going to pay for all that you've done!" Crossbeam howled before attacking him with her crowbar. Zenjin deflected all of her attacks, but this apricot colored fairy just wouldn't give in. She kept on throwing that crowbar at him, and no matter how many times he held her off, she just wouldn't give up.

Ghislain came and helped Cure Twilight to her feet. "Are you alright, Cure Twilight?"

"Yeah. But my friends are down there! I have to go and see if they're alright!" Cure Twilight exclaimed. Ghislain could see the heartfelt worry in her eyes. A smile flashed on his wrinkled face. He could see why the Heart Lighter chose a girl like Riko and give her the powers of Pretty Cure.

"You have a kind heart, miss. Now go and help your friends," Ghislain told her gently.

"Not if I have anything to say about it!"

That voice! Could it be?

* * *

Cure Dawn was the first to wake up. When she rubbed her eyes, she looked up and saw a huge tower of floors that seemed to reach toward the heavens. There were stairs, yes, but they seemed to coil all around the floors, going on forever. "Whoa…"

"Ugh! We're not dead, right?" Cure Dusk exclaimed.

"No. You're good," Cure Dawn deadpanned.

"Is everyone alright?" Moonbeam asked with concern peppering her sweet voice. She grabbed Cure Starlight's shoulder and helped her get back on her feet.

"I am, sort of," Starlight mused.

Skylight rubbed her eyes and got back on her feet. "Whoa! We have to go all the way back to the top?!" Skylight exclaimed, flabbergasted by how big the pseudo-tower is. The tower was so massive, it made Skylight fall back on her tail.

"It seems like it," Sunbeam said. "I don't have enough energy to turn into a cape!"

"Me either!" Starbeam exclaimed worriedly. "This is most awful!"

"Agh! My wing shoes don't work!" Dusk exclaimed. She tried to activate the wings on her shoes, but they didn't do anything.

Dawn tried to activate the wings on her own shoes. Nothing. Starlight and Skylight tried as well. Again, nothing. No matter what they did, the wings on all of their shoes just wouldn't activate. "How did this happen?!" Starlight yelped fearfully.

"Did the fall do this?!" Dawn yelped.

"Skylight! How are your wings? Are they okay?" Starbeam asked.

Skylight flapped her large wings twice. She didn't feel any jolts of pain from within them, and they moved just fine. None of her feathers were out of place, nor did they bend in odd angles. "They seem okay."

"We might have to walk up all these stairs," Sunbeam said grimly.

"Awww! This is gonna take forever!" Cure Dusk complained.

"Come on! Cure Twilight's up there and she may need our help!" Cure Dawn took Dusk by the arm and forced her up the stairs.

"Let us make haste!" Starbeam was the first to float up the stairs. Everyone else followed her lead. There was no time to do any complaining. They had to get to the top. Cure Twilight needed them.

* * *

"Decebal!" Ghislain shouted.

"In the flesh, you corrupt king," Decebal sneered. He then descended before a frazzled Zenjin, pulled his rapier out, and pointed it at Zenjin. "You did your part. Now hand the Energia over to me, you scum!"

"Never! I worked too hard to get this thing! I'm not done with my experiment on Mana yet!" Zenjin roared, clutching his chest like he was having a heart attack.

'_Mana?'_ Riko thought. He said the name Mana. That basically confirmed that he really did take Katsunuma Mana from the Shining Light Hospice, just like the news said. At least he confessed to his crime. But what did he mean by experiment on her? The sphere had grown several sizes larger before this. Now it was the size of three queen sized beds stacked together. She had stopped screaming long before this.

She didn't have time to think about it anymore. She had to go down and get her friends. But before she could go and do so, a small thorny vine sprouted out from the ground and coiled around her leg. "Owww!" The thorns left red marks on her skin. Cure Twilight got her claws out and managed to slash them apart. But the wings on her feet didn't activate. "Come on! Work already!" Cure Twilight stomped her feet so she could activate them, but it didn't work.

"You're NOT going to take it away from me!" Zenjin roared as he lunged at the man who betrayed him. He would never forgive him for his sacrilegious crime against him. No he wouldn't. But Decebal took his arm and shoved it away.

"You abandoned me!" Zenjin roared, creating a huge sphere of black light. Without mercy or hesitation, he threw it at Decebal, hoping it'd finally do away with him once and for all. But the sphere was slashed right in half, disappearing into thin air. "But how?!"

"You're such a stupid boy," Decebal hissed as he grabbed Zenjin's chin quite forcefully. "If only there was someone out there who loved you."

"Quit playing mind games with him, Decebal!" Ghislain roared, drawing his sword and clashing it with Decebal's. "It's your fault Zenjin came out like this! You tricked him and used him for your own ends! That is not how you treat a child, especially considering what he's been through!"

"Don't act like you're some angelic savior!" Decebal roared, knocking Ghislain's blade out of his hands.

Suddenly, Zenjin grabbed a huge chunk of Decebal's hair and threw him into the air like he was a rag doll. With eyes brimming with scorn, Zenjin soared up to Decebal and pummeled him with a huge flurry of punches and kicks that went so fast, they probably couldn't be seen by the naked eye. Decebal tried to fight back, but Zenjin came at him so fast he had virtually no time to react. Finally, Zenjin took Decebal and tossed him to the ground. As soon as he made contact with the floor, a huge cloud of smoke appeared.

The smoke cleared, revealing a huge crater underneath a very worn out and battered Decebal. Kyoya watched from behind the rock, his green eyes wide with shock. He knew how strong Zenjin was and that he wasn't to be messed with, but he was still in awe of how invincible he was. In a way, Kyoya wondered if this battle could even be won. More than that, where was everyone else? He hoped they were alive.

"I've won, Decebal! I'm keeping the Energia and that's final!" Zenjin roared. At this point, his eyesight began to blur. Much more so than usual. Decebal seemed to blend into the crater. Zenjin rubbed his eyes. "Ugh! Why do my eyes keep doing this?!" He yelled in frustration.

The red sphere grew some more.

"Should we...do something?" Cure Twilight asked Ghislain.

"Not right now. They have to settle this themselves. It's about time, too," Ghislain replied ruefully. He wished he had never asked Decebal to take care of Zenjin. If he had known he was going to do all of this, Ghislain would never have handed him over to him, and so many lives would have been saved.

* * *

"Uuuuugh! My legs feel like pudding!" Cure Dusk complained as she ran up yet another flight of stairs. "How many floors did we go up?"

"About eight," Skylight replied irritably.

"You've been counting?!" Moonbeam yelped, her long ears standing straight up.

"Yes. We need to keep track of something," Skylight hissed. Everyone's legs burned inside and out from too much running. Their lungs burned from all the breaths they took in, all the effort they used, and they were close to passing out.

Sunbeam's ears twitched a little. "I hear a voice up a few floors!"

"I wish we could teleport!" Cure Dusk complained.

They had to go up two more flights of stairs. After about ten floors of finding absolutely nothing, they finally found a pile of thorn vines...with Lovebeam caught in them.

"LOVEBEAM!" Everyone shouted in unison. Starbeam, Sunbeam, and Moonbeam all flew over to their sister.

"You're okay! We were so worried!" Moonbeam chirped, her voice awash with relief.

Starbeam noticed the thorns. "Oh my goodness! What happened to you?"

"I was trying to fight Zenjin and he trapped me in these thorns. I can't get them off me!" Lovebeam said as she yet again tried to pry some thorns off of her ear.

"Calm down," Skylight said as she pulled out her cutlass. "I'll try and cut these."

"Pleeeeease be careful!" Moonbeam advised.

Skylight knew the purple rabbit had good reason to be concerned. With one swing of her cutlass, she tried cutting the thorns. It didn't work. The cutlass didn't leave so much as a dent. Later, Skylight kneeled down and tried cutting it the old fashioned way, sawing at it like she was cutting a piece of carrot with a knife. She made sure to be as careful as she could be. Unfortunately, that didn't work either. "It's not working!" Skylight said.

"How about a little fire power, then?" Cure Dusk snapped her fingers and a small flame appeared above her hand.

"No! Don't do that!" Starbeam wailed.

"Why not? Nothing else is working!" Cure Dusk yelped.

"These vines are plants! If you light them on fire, you could risk Lovebeam getting caught in the blaze and sustaining massive third degree burns that could potentially disfigure her for the rest of her life!" Starbeam explained tearfully.

Cure Dusk let the flame on her hand go out. "Ugh. You're right."

"What do we do? We can't just leave her here," Cure Dawn asked worriedly.

"Actually, yes you can."

Everyone turned to face Lovebeam with wide eyes. "What?!"

"You girls have to go on ahead. Don't worry about me. I'll get myself out of this somehow," Lovebeam told them in a strangely calm and matter-of-fact way. Nobody could believe what was coming out of her mouth. She was seriously asking them to leave her behind?

Moonbeam took Lovebeams bloody red hands into her own. "No! We're not leaving you behind, especially like this! Your our sister! We have to get you out of here somehow!"

"But what can you do now? Go on. Riko-chan needs you. I'll try to get through this somehow. Besides, Mom's up there. She might be worried about you girls by now," Lovebeam told them reassuringly. The girls couldn't believe it. This was definitely not the whiny, annoying, childish, bratty, over dramatic, selfish, self-centered Lovebeam they first met last year.

Cure Dawn smiled. "Alright then. Just hang tight, okay? We'll try to come back down when we can."

"Don't worry about me! Just go and help Riko-chan and King Ghislain! They need the Luminous Pretty Cure!" Lovebeam exclaimed, shooing them off by waving her hand up and down. "Just be careful."

"We will. Come on, girls," Cure Dawn lead the way this time.

"Uuuuugh! More stairs. Kill me," Cure Dusk complained, limping up the stairs and breathing heavily.

Lovebeam found herself all alone. As calm and collected as she was toward the girls, the same calmness immediately faded away. Her chubby pink face donned a sad look. She looked up at the many layers of the battlefield. "How _can_ I get out of this mess?" She asked herself in a soft voice.

* * *

In a Rozanielan hospital, Hornbeam and several other doctors finished wrapping gauze around Celestia's broken wing. Another doctor calmed her down by feeding her rainbow colored oats, her favorite meal. Malgorzata watched nervously, clutching a part of her Native American styled shirt as she watched her favorite friend be tended to by the doctors. She had never seen her beautiful Celestia so weak and fragile, but she knew she was still a strong alicorn, just like Vespasian. Hornbeam approached her with a smile on his face. "Good news. We managed to stitch up her wing and put some gauze around it. If she stays off her wings for about six weeks, her wing should heal up nicely," He told her kindly.

"Thank you so much, Hornbeam," Malgorzata told him, her voice peppered with soft gratitude. "You don't know how much my husband and I appreciate your kindness."

Hornbeam blushed a bit. "It's no big deal. I love helping all kinds of creatures, human and animal. I'm just glad nothing worse happened. Alicorns are in enough danger as it is thanks to Zenjin's rampage last year," Hornbeam said nervously, removing his top hat and scratching his head a bit.

"How is Vespasian?" Malgorzata asked.

"His wing is better, but he hasn't been eating," Hornbeam told her a bit solemnly this time. "Keith suspects there may be something else going on. I'll go check up on him," With that, Hornbeam floated off to the next work to check on Vespasian's welfare.

Her heart awash with relief, Malgorzata walked over to her noble steed and stroke her sparkling mane. Celestia whinnied softly, with a warm, gentle look in her eyes. Malgorzata smiled as she stroke her steed's hair. "You did great, Celestia. When you get discharged, I'll have some nice oats for you at the stable."

Celestia whinnied again.

"Vespasian's in the other room, dear," Malgorzata told her reassuringly. "He'll be just fine," Although Malgorzata wanted to believe that, some doubt creeped into her heart. Hornbeam said Vespasian wasn't eating. As far as she knew, Vespasian was always a big glutton, always licking every oat he could find or stealing carrots from other alicorns. This was very out of character for her husband's steed.

But she had no time to think about that now. Both Jervis and Nessarose came into the room, with Nessarose holding a clip board and Jervis the old diary he deciphered. Nessarose was the first to speak. "Queen Malgorzata?"

"Yes? What is it?"

"We got the DNA results back. You're...not going to believe this…" Nervously, Nessarose handed the clipboard to the queen.

It only took one look at the clipboard for a hand to fly to her mouth. She couldn't believe it. She had to sit on a nearby chair. "My word…"

Jervis approached her nervously. "There's something else, too. I...I finished deciphering the diary."

"What did you find?" Malgorzata choked out.

Jervis pressed his lips together grimly.

**Author's Note: Meh, I'm not too proud of how this chapter came out. I suck at writing battle scenes. But I am definitely going all out for the next chapter, as I've been wanting to write this one ever since I came up with it. It won't be for everyone, but I want to write it out so I can finally get it out and be one step closer to finishing my fan series once and for all! Only six chapters left!**


	52. Zenjin's Created a Monster!

Being reworked


	53. A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes

Being reworked


	54. Bonus 7: Anzu's Memories

_**Trigger warning: mention of wrist cutting, though it's only discussed.**_

Your name is Anzu Chino, and for a while, you suspected there was bad blood between your parents.

You first noticed it when you were about five. You notice they'd glare at each other for no reason at all. Some days, they could go for whole days without talking to each other. Other days, you'd come home from school hearing nothing but yelling and screaming, and if you told them to stop, they wouldn't hear you. But you never understood what they were fighting about. Their voices were so loud and banged on your ears so much that you didn't care what they fought about. You just wanted it to stop.

You wanted to get away, but you couldn't. Your parents strictly said that little girls your age shouldn't be outside the house, especially all alone. Who knows who might be lurking around, planning to kidnap little kids like you? But what else could you do? You love being in your room, but you could still hear them. You want to play your music really loud, but your mother always tells you to stop or you'll disturb the neighbors. All you could do was just get through every day, watching cartoons, reading books, play acting, and doing homework.

At seven years old, you made your first new friends. Your first friend was a boy named Kusaka Mitsuru. He had messy, choppy chocolate brown hair and deep blue eyes like the night sky. He approached you once, going on and on about how he loved Pokemon and that your Charizard figure was super cool. You only brought it with you so you could look at it when lessons get boring. You're surprised that you already found someone who likes something you like. But you're happy anyway, and from then on, you two start hanging out.

Your second friend was another boy, Midorikawa Hikari. Unlike Mitsuru, he was very messy, and often got in trouble during class for little things, such as forgetting his books, making messes, talking during class, not paying attention, etc. But he liked Pokemon way more than Mitsuru, and once again, you two hit it off like peanut butter and jelly. You didn't know it back then, but you, Mitsuru, and Hikari would stick together for years. But back then, all you could do was talk during recess.

At nine years old, you discovered that you have a strange fondness for gory and violent horror movies, like Carrie and Ichi The Killer. You weren't sure why you liked them so much, so for now, you decided not to tell your friends about them. You needed to figure things out first. But in third grade, you, Mitsuru, and Hikari began making plans to hang out more outside of school. The three of you exchanged phone numbers and home addresses, hoping to meet up every once in a while so you could hang out.

Those were your golden years. Whenever your parents would fight, you'd leave a note and storm out of the house every chance you got to hang out with Mitsuru or Hikari, and their families welcomed you with open arms every time. You'd spend hours and hours with them either watching anime, reading books, playing pretend games in their back yards with makeshift costumes and plastic weapons, play video games like Animal Crossing and Pokemon, or just sitting around talking and eating food.

That year before Christmas break, Mitsuru came up to you during recess. "Hey, An? I have something for you," Mitsuru said.

"What is it?" You ask.

Mitsuru rummaged through his jean pocket and pulled out a shiny harmonica. You're delighted by the sight of it. You had seen harmonicas on TV and in stores before, but you never got to see one this close before. "Wow! That's a harmonica, right?"

"It used to be my grandpa's and my dad's. But I'm no good at playing it, and I know my brother's gonna wreck it, so I want you to have it," Mitsuru told you. You take the harmonica in your hands and look at it closely. You're in awe of its shiny sleekness, the little holes on the sides, and the engraving on the top that read _'Be Yourself.'_

"Thanks so much, Mitsuru-kun!" You chirp gratefully and trap him in a hug. "But I don't know if I'll be any good at it, though."

"You don't have to play it. You can just keep it," Mitsuru said. "Merry almost Christmas, An."

"Merry almost Christmas to you, too!" You say before giving him your own present, which was some Pokemon trading cards you don't want anymore. He accepted them without protest.

You absolutely adore the harmonica. Ever since then, whenever your parents would fight, you'd go to the park and practice every single day. At first, you sucked, and the sound just wouldn't come out right. But every day you'd go to a quiet place and practice, practice, practice. Little by little, you slowly got better. By the time you were in fifth grade, you pretty much mastered it.

But other things sparked up during that time. One day at dinner, your mother dropped a bomb on you and your dad. "Anzu? I don't think you should be seeing those boys you're friends with anymore."

Your dad was so shocked he dropped his spoon. "Reika!"

"Mitsuru and Hikari? How come? They're my friends," You ask, confused.

"I don't think they're a very good influence on you," Reika told you in a serious tone of voice. "A proper lady shouldn't be hanging out with rambunctious, troublesome boys."

"They're not bad," You pipe in. "They're super duper nice! We play together and help each other with our homework and all that stuff."

"She's right, Reika. They're very good kids," Your father agreed with you. But Reika kept that solemn look on her face even as she sipped her tea.

"Anzu. You're eight years old now. It's about time you stopped being obsessed with comic books and cartoons and all that rubbish. It's time you learned to be more like a proper lady," Reika told her in an icy voice.

"Reika. Anzu's just fine the way she is," Your father told her, but it didn't faze her one bit. After that, she said nothing.

But later that night, when you got out of the bath, you heard your parents arguing. "Junnosuke. Next year, I want Anzu to attend Seioh Girls' Academy. I've already signed her up for piano lessons starting next week."

"Reika. What are you saying? Hold on just a moment. What's all this about?"

"As Anzu's mother, I want her to grow up with grace, and Seioh happens to be a fitting environment for a young lady. It focuses on manners and is well known for raising well behaved girls. I didn't want to bring this up during dinner, but you know Anzu's language and style of dress have become vulgar. It's because you keep letting her watch superhero shows and hang out with those boys at that school."

"Reika. Stop this. You talk like you want to control every aspect of Anzu's life. I want Anzu to grow up being happy with who she is, what she likes and doesn't like, and I trust her to make her own decisions. If you're not willing to acknowledge that children are different, then-"

"I only want what's best for Anzu! She deserves the best care and the best services!"

"Don't you mean what's best for yourself?" Your father gave her an oddly scary look. You never saw him look like that before. "Reika. I don't know what your situation is, but...why should Anzu be forced to be something she's not?"

"Junnosuke! Don't you have any concern for Anzu at all?! You always let her watch those horror movies and play violent video games! Don't you know what those do to people?! Haven't you heard the stories?! I don't want Anzu growing up to be one of those people!"

"She won't, Reika. Anzu knows full well that movies and video games are just that. Movies and video games. I made sure to teach her the difference between real life and make believe from the beginning, and she knows better than to imitate what she sees on TV. I know for a fact that Anzu won't grow up like that. She's a good girl. If she likes comic books and horror movies and wearing black clothes, it's okay. Why can't you understand that?"

"The only thing I understand is that you refuse to set appropriate boundaries for your child! You have no idea what kind of warped messages Anzu could be taking from them!"

"That's another thing, too. Another thing you care too much about is that you always freak out whenever Anzu mentions wanting to watch or read anything. You can't hide that kind of stuff from her, Reika. Children see things you don't expect them to, make believe or not. Anzu hears us fight every day. Have you ever thought about that?"

Reika said nothing for a moment. She just looked at the floor, tight lipped, clutching her arm. Finally, she spoke in a cold voice. "You're too soft on her. If you keep this up, she'll grow up confused and make bad decisions. Someone has to take charge and set her on the right path. I'm not going to let you or her embarrass this family!"

You don't want to hear it anymore. You run to your room and try to go back to sleep. But you can't.

Hearing that made you realize something: you're not the daughter she wants. But embarrassing the family? That made your blood boil. What was wrong with hanging out with your friends, doing and wearing what you wanted? You didn't understand how your mother thought this was bad. But you knew this much: you weren't an embarrassment.

You spend more and more time away from your house. Mitsuru's house. Hikari's house. The park. Anywhere. Your dad had a good point. You're smart. You know movies and video games are just those, and they're not making you do bad stuff. You only do those things because they're fun. What does she know? But you don't want to grow up all fancy and posh, wearing dresses and high heels and make up. You hate those. Costume dresses are okay. Makeup makes you feel weird and not recognize yourself, and it feels sticky. You're no good at the piano. You tried it once and you sucked. But you know one thing for sure: there's nothing wrong with being different.

In fourth grade, things changed. Mitsuru came to school wearing all black clothes. Loose pants (but not to the point where his butt would show. Ew!), black shoes, a black shirt, and a black book bag. "Wow. New look, Mitsuru-kun?" You ask.

"Yep! Starting today, I'm a goth!" Mitsuru announced cheerfully.

You're a bit confused. "But...don't goths act sad all the time and cut their wrists and do drugs? I saw something like that on TV."

"No no! I'm not gonna be one of those goths!" Mitsuru exclaimed, waving his hand back and forth. "Besides, not all goths are like that!"

"Where did you get those clothes anyway?" Hikari asked curiously.

"Hot Topic. These pants are REALLY comfy! You should try them! Look at all the pockets they have!" Mitsuru exclaimed.

At first, you were a bit perplexed by Mitsuru's sudden change. Who becomes a goth at ten years old? You're not sure. But you remind yourself that Mitsuru's your best friend, and he's happy with what he's decided, so you're okay with it. In a way, a new curiosity blossomed in your heart. "Dad? Can we go to the mall later?" You ask in the car when Junnosuke picks you up.

"Okay. That's fine. Is there any place you want to go?"

"Hot Topic. I want to try out some new clothes."

"I see. We'll go tomorrow."

At first, your dad was quite surprised when you decided you wanted to wear those bondage pants, as people call them. But Mitsuru was right. They are comfy! Not only that, their pockets are big, and you can hang little key chains from the silver things. You get other clothes as well, such as Pokemon, Invader Zim, Spiderman, Wonder Woman, Doctor Who, and Batman themed shirts and other merchandise. But you wore those clothes for comfort, and your dad seemed to get it, so he was okay with it.

Fourth grade also brought along a new friend, a girl named Tobe Urara. At first, you weren't sure you could be friends with her. She looked like a girl who would look at you with disgust the minute she learned of your interests and style of dress. She was certainly the epitome of girliness. In a way, she even looked like the girl your mother wanted you to be: sweet, charming, polite, ladylike, with a love for jewelry, makeup, and dresses, etc.

You found yourself unable to approach her at first. But something unexpected happened. She approached you. "Oh! Is that Ouran High School Host Club?" You whipped your head around upon hearing her voice. She looked at your manga with sparkling eyes. You had a dumb look on your face.

"You...like this?"

"Yeah! I love Ouran! Who's your favorite host? Honey's my favorite! He's so cute!"

You flash a big smile. "I like the twins. They're hilarious," You reply.

"Oh! I notice you like Batman, too. Have you seen the animated series? It's awesome!"

"You like Batman? You look like you'd be more into High School Musical."

"I'm not the biggest fan of it. My little sisters love it but I think it's overrated. I love your shirt, by the way."

You look down at your Pokemon shirt, with Squirtle, Pikachu, Bulbasaur, and Charmander on it. "Thanks! Wanna hang out at recess later?"

"Sure!"

You couldn't believe it. A new friend! You couldn't wait to introduce her to Mitsuru and Hikari. At first, you were a bit afraid that they wouldn't like her. But your fears turned out to be false, as they accepted her with open arms. Since then, you, Mitsuru, Urara, and Hikari become even thicker than thieves. You even invite your friends to your house so you can have fun and do whatever you want. Who cares what Reika says? Your dad doesn't mind. What's so bad about hanging out with your slightly unconventional friends? Nothing wrong with that, right?

However, during that time, you got hit with some shocking news. "Anzu. I'm sorry, but I have to leave for a week, maybe longer. You'll be staying here with your mother while I'm gone."

"How come? Why can't I go with you?" You ask, confused and sad.

"There are some private matters I need to tend to with my family. I don't want you to get caught up in it. Plus, you'd be bored if I took you with me," He explained.

You wished you could go with him. You love your mother, but you don't like that she can be a bit of a drama queen sometimes. She hardly ever let you have any fun. She barely ever let you do what you wanted or wear the clothes you wanted. Granted, with some convincing she let you, but you knew that had its limits. With a heavy heart, you watched your dad pull out of the driveway and be gone for a week. But you knew his cell phone number. If you needed him, all you had to do was call.

Unfortunately, a week was all it took for your mother to reveal her true nature.

She hid all of your comic books, DVDs, and video games. She stashed them all in her closet and won't let you near them. She took you out to the mall and made you try on girly clothes, even though you explicitly told her that you didn't like them. Not only that, she signed you up for piano lessons every single day during school, and when you come home and want to relax, she makes you sit at the table doing homework. She doesn't even help you with it. She just watches you like a hawk and gets mad when you can't solve it right. Even at dinner, when you want to eat, she criticizes the way you hold your utensils and eat your food.

One day, you two got in an argument. "Anzu! You're not seriously going to wear _that_ to school, are you?!"

"Uh, yeah?" You deadpan. You didn't see anything wrong with your purple Batman shirt, black bondage pants, black socks, and baby blue and white sneakers. You thought you looked fine. But your mother had a face that made her look like she saw Anzu come out of a sewer.

"You look like a hikikomori! I don't know what kind of getup your father lets you wear, but I'm in charge now, and you'll find that kids don't wear that kind of rubbish," Reika told you.

"How do you know? You're always sitting in an office every day!" You snap. What did she know about what kids wore these days?

"Don't take that tone with me, young lady! March up to your room right this instant and change into some proper clothing! You don't want people thinking you're a deadbeat, do you?"

"I don't care what people think, unlike you!"

"Chino Anzu! I'm your mother! I'm trying to raise you to be decent and proper! I can't have people seeing you dress like a hobo!"

Something snapped inside you, and you weren't afraid to let it all out. "Oh, is THAT what you care about?! You wonder why I don't like you! All you care about is how I look and how I act! I'm sick of it! Let me wear what I want! It's not like I'm some psycho murderer out to kill people! Times have changed, Mom! Maybe you can change with them!"

"I should have transferred you to another school long ago! Those friends of yours are a bad influence on you, if your grades are anything to go by! When are you going to get out of this ridiculous phase?!"

That did it for you. Your grades are fine. You get B's in everything. She doesn't even read your report cards half the time. But nobody disses your friends. Nobody. "Gimme a break! You don't know anything about them OR me! You don't even help me with my homework when I need help! It's always Anzu do this, Anzu do that! Don't you ever think about anything besides yourself?! You wonder why I don't stay in the house half the time! I can't stand you always acting like you have to lock me in here and hide me from the world! At least Mitsuru's and Hikari's parents like me! Heck, Mitsuru, Hikari, and Urara like me for who I am, unlike you! Get over it, Mom! Stop trying to _'protect'_ me!"

She was about to grab you, but you get your stuff and leave. After that, you finally tell Junnosuke about it. After that, you and your mother don't speak to each other at all. You spend more time with Urara, Mitsuru, and Hikari. For once, your mother doesn't even bat an eye. She doesn't say a word.

This didn't mean she didn't change her mind, though. "This is so absolutely degrading…" You hear her mutter after the argument. You rolled your eyes. Heaven forbid her daughter not be the girly carbon copy of herself that she wanted her to be. That pretty much said volumes of how little she cared about you.

No matter, you thought. You have your friends and your dad. You can get through this, you told yourself. It's not the end of the world. However, when fourth grade ended, right after you made plans with your friends to go to the ice cream shop by yourselves, your father drops a bomb on you. "We're...moving?"

Junnosuke nodded nervously, like he knew you would ask that. "Sorry, Anzu. Your mother moved out of the house, and my pay alone isn't enough to pay for the mortgage," You don't know what mortgage is, and at this point, you don't care. "The recession is pretty bad for a lot of people, us included. But it's not all bad. I found a new house at a town called Hikaribashi. It's a nice place."

"But...but my friends are here! I don't wanna leave them!"

"I know. I wish we could stay here, too. But it can't be helped, Anzu. Besides, your mother and I...we just can't make things work between us," Your father says, his voice sounding really sad. "But don't lose heart, sweetie. You have all your friends' email addresses, right? You can still talk to them no matter how far away we are from them. True friends always keep in touch."

As happy as you are about being away from Reika, you don't want to leave your best friends behind. They've done so much for you, and now you're just leaving them all here? You feel like you just committed a crime against them.

"When do we leave?"

"Next week."

The very next day, you tell your friends about it. Urara broke into tears and hugged you. "Don't leave, An-chan! We haven't gone to the mall together yet!"

"Sorry to hear that, An. I can't believe you're leaving," Hikari said.

"I know. I don't like it either. Dad said we don't have enough money to stay in our house anymore," You tell them sheepishly. It came out forced. You wonder if they think it's some kind of excuse. "Are you mad?"

"No. Why would we be? This stuff just happens. But we'll always be friends, An! Never forget that!" Mitsuru exclaimed, holding his hand out. You smile and put your hand on his. Then Hikari, and Urara.

"Friends forever, right?"

"Forever!"

"I don't want to leave. I want to stay here with you forever. I wanted us to start middle school together," You tell them tearfully.

"It's okay. We'll keep in touch! Maybe when we're older, we'll come and visit! If we turn sixteen and get driver's licenses, we can drive up there!" Urara exclaimed.

"That'd be the day," You chirp.

With a heavy heart, you say goodbye to your friends when you and Junnosuke leave for Hikaribashi. You wish you could stay with them forever. True, you have their email addresses and phone numbers, but you know won't be the same.

Hikaribashi turned out to be quite nice. The house you and Junnosuke live in is pretty fancy despite being smaller than your other house, and you and Junnosuke get to spend time together. At least Junnosuke appreciates you and loves you for you. But later, you had to start school. You had an inkling that Hikaribashi Middle School wasn't going to be like Yuuhi Elementary. The fact that you won't get to go to school with Urara, Hikari, and Mitsuru was enough to make you tear up a little.

You don't know anyone.

Fifth grade had its ups and downs. The teachers were nice, and you studied hard and got good grades like you always did. But nobody around you seemed to be interested in being your friend, and whenever you did try to approach them, they'd either look at you with distaste or run away like their house was on fire. That made you confused. When you went to lunch and sat at a table all by yourself, you could see some gossipy girls glancing at you, pointing fingers at you, whispering about you despite how loud the lunch room was, etc. You never used to care about people talking trash about you. But now that you were alone, you didn't know what to do.

While waiting for Junnosuke to pick you up, you heard some girls talking. "Chino scares me. She dresses in all black. That's so creepy."

"She's gotta be one of those emo goth people."

"She must secretly talk trash about people, hate life, and cut her wrists."

"I know. I say we stay away from her. I don't wanna catch the emo disease," The girls burst into laughter afterward.

They found it funny, but you didn't. You're not sure what makes them think or talk like that. True, there's always a couple of mean spirited snobs in every school, so they're unavoidable for the most part. But you're not the person they think you are.

You ought to show them. Do what you've always done. Don't care. Just be you. It's what Urara, Hikari, and Mitsuru would want.

That's exactly what you do.

You're twelve years old and in sixth grade. At school, you're the quiet girl who doesn't want to talk to anyone and who nobody approaches. You still answer questions when asked, partake in group projects for a grade, and pay attention during lessons. At home, you're a chatterbox, always going on and on about stuff with a happy Junnosuke. But you feel empty. You don't feel complete without Urara, Hikari, and Mitsuru. You call them and message them every once in a while, and it's not the same.

Urara understood. During one phone call, she told you this.

"Try and find someone who may need a friend. Who knows? Maybe there's someone at your school who's lonely and wants someone to be with."

You thought about Marina, the orange haired girl who picks on people, you included. Everyone avoided her like the plague because of that. Sometimes you'd see her alone at a table, crying. You wanted to try befriending her, but you aren't sure.

You're thirteen years old and in seventh grade. The person Urara talked about transferred to school. A mousy looking girl named Tasogare Riko. She takes you to the nurse's office after you puke. She likes manga. You took the chance to befriend her, and you find yourself feeling just as happy as when you hung out with your old trio of friends. Not only that, she actually managed to befriend Marina, something you thought you couldn't do, even though the latter had been mean to everyone, you included. Not only that, there proved to be more to Marina than her facade. If Riko could befriend her, why couldn't you?

You found your place at Hikaribashi after all. You're friends with Riko, Kyoya, and Marina and hang out with them every chance you get, both in school and out. It's not like the time you spent with Mitsuru, Hikari, and Urara, but you don't mind. Just being around friends was enough to make you happy.

You managed to make it this far. You can go farther, no matter what happens.


	55. Bonus 8: Hotaru's Memories

Your name is Hotaru, and your love for the stars began when you were about seven years old.

Whenever Sojiro or Kyouichi would take you anywhere and you had to wait for a long time, you would pace around and get angry. You hated waiting around for really long periods of time, especially with nothing to do. Sojiro decided to rectify this by buying you a tiny toy telescope. It had pictures integrated into the lens, and when you pressed a button, it would switch from one picture to another. Sojiro only bought it for you just so you'd have something to bring with you when you went out with your parents and have something to do to pass the time.

Oh, you used it alright. You loved looking through the pictures. A map of the solar system. A solar flare. The wavy, sparkling bridge of stars called the Milky Way, though back then you never understood why it was called the Milky Way, as you always associated milk with the liquid that you drink that comes from cows. A comet going across the night sky. Some multicolored nebulas. The Big and Little Dippers. The constellation Ophiuchus and three of its stars, Cebalrai, Rasalhague, and Marfik.

You spent all day staring into that thing, sometimes spending hours just looking at one picture alone. You were so engrossed in it that you would miss meals, forget to do homework, or just sit around in your room not doing anything. Because you spent so much time with that telescope and didn't do your homework, you got in trouble in school and got some bad grades. Once your parents explained everything to you, you managed to bounce back and make up for it, resulting in better grades.

When you were about ten years old, in science class you and your classmates learned about stars and constellations at one point. Unlike everyone else, who didn't care about learning about stars, you paid attention to everything the teacher said, jotted down notes on everything faster than a typewriter, and answered questions quite articulately. Even the teacher was surprised at your vast knowledge of the stars. You even asked to talk about the constellation Ophiuchus, since that was the only constellation the teacher didn't talk about. The teacher rebuffed your request, saying that they had to move on with the lesson. You quietly and gracefully conceded defeat.

At eleven years old, your writing teacher (Hikaribashi had a creative writing class, but it was dropped in later years due to budget cuts) gave your class an assignment, writing ten pages of a story about anything you like. It could be about anything you could create. An idea hatched in your head. A magical girl story about a princess from space who defeats evil monsters trying to take her home. You even came up with a title for it: Magical Star Princess Ophiuchus. You poured over that story like you were giving birth to your first child, writing, writing, writing, erasing, rewriting, you scribbled in that notebook to the point where you wound up crumpling many pages.

Your story was about a shy princess who gets granted magical powers by a group of cute star fairies. Together, she and her star fairies fight off the evil empire who wanted to conquer the Milky Way Palace. You wind up writing about twenty pages before typing it on the computer. Again, you forget to do your math and history homework, and you got in trouble for that too. But you enjoyed going up in front of the class and reading your story out loud. However, you notice that instead of cheering and finding themselves liking it, kids either looked confused or completely uninterested. You start hearing comments.

"I didn't like it. It's too depressing."

"Why does everybody hate Ophie?" (This was the classmate's nickname for Ophiuchus since she can't pronounce the actual name right)

"Blech! Too girly!"

"I'm glad she won in the end, but she didn't have to make everybody hate Ophie, even the good guys."

"That story makes me sick. My sister's just like Ophie and she's the awesomest person ever. Hotaru-chan writes Ophie like she hates her."

You don't like the comments everyone is saying about your story. You try to explain it to them. "That's not true! I don't hate Ophiuchus, and not everybody hates her either! I gave her friends! I made her defeat the bad guys!" But nobody listens, and the story is all everyone talks about for the rest of the year.

Even your teacher agrees with them. "Hotaru. I liked your story. I really do. But the children do bring up some valid points. I know you had good intentions, but the way you write everyone just hating your main character comes off as if you're just punishing her or trying to yank sympathy out of the readers. That's not a good way to write both a character or a story."

You don't get what she means, but after that, you come to hate your story. You stash it in your closet, wishing you had never written it in the first place.

Not only that, later that week, you lost your favorite toy telescope. You search all over the house. You leave clothes, books, papers, and notebooks lying all over your room as though someone tried to burglarize it. No toy telescope. You search through your clothes, thinking you might have put it in your pocket or somewhere. No toy telescope. In the kitchen. In the basement. In the living room. In the dining room. Nothing. You can't believe you lost it. You storm off to your room and cry for half an hour straight. You find yourself grumpy and miserable for two straight weeks, angry at yourself for losing the thing that cultivated your interest in stars. But you do find yourself renting and buying many books on space and stars, interested in eating up every single piece of information on every planet, constellation, galaxy, or other celestial bodies you can get your brain's hands on.

At thirteen, you decide to try and start an astronomy club. Hikaribashi Middle School has a lot of after school clubs. Chess club. Math club. Science club. Music club. The school band. You heard a lot of stories about middle schools having lots of clubs. If they can do it, why can't you? You decide to try and find some teachers and see if you can start a club. You manage to find one Mr. Tsutsumi.

"Tsutsumi-sensei? Can kids start after school clubs here?" You ask innocently.

Mr. Tsutsumi shook his head. "I'm afraid not, Minamigawa."

Your hopes are torn apart like someone ripping a candy wrapper open and throwing it in the trash. "How come?"

"Only teachers are allowed to make school clubs here, because here at the middle school, all school clubs absolutely have to contribute to the children's learning experience. Plus, we just don't have the funding, and the principal doesn't think kids your age are mature enough to make a school club. Sorry, Minamigawa. That's just the way things are."

You found a contradiction to his answer. "Then how come we have a Chess Club? That has nothing to do with school!"

"That's only because the school participates in chess competitions, and it was the principal's idea. We've been chess champions for four years straight."

You don't care about chess. You're just angry that the school won't let you make an astronomy club because of it's hypocrisy. Astronomy is all about learning about the stars and space, but chess club, based around nothing but moving plastic pieces across a board, gets approved? You decide it's no longer worth pursuing.

When you get home that day, you're irritated and grumpy. plopping on the couch to watch TV. A crime drama appears. Sojiro comes into the room. "What's wrong, sweetie?"

"The school won't let me start an astronomy club."

"How come?"

"Some mumbo jumbo about how teachers are the only ones allowed to start clubs!" You go on to tell him the rest of what Mr. Tsutsumi said.

Sojiro smiled. "I see. I do have some good news. Hikaribashi High School lets students start school clubs."

You whip your head around to face him. "What?! Really?"

Sojiro nodded. "You'll have to wait until you get a little older, but when you go to the high school, you can start an astronomy club there. They're more open about kids starting all kinds of clubs than the middle school is."

You decide that when you get to high school, you'll start an astronomy club! It'd make your day to find people who were interested in astronomy and stars and space.

Unfortunately for you, there weren't any in middle school. The only times you ever interacted with anyone was when the teachers would put you in groups to do group work. That was it. Other kids didn't even bother to interact with you unless they wanted to copy your notes or just outright do their homework for them. You always hated that. Kids all had their own cliques. Sometimes you heard them gossip about you, saying you're stuck up and obsessed with stars, too weird to hang out with the cool kids.

One day, one of the snottier, more popular girls came up to you and asked, "Minamigawa-san? Can you do me a favor? Would it be okay if I copied yesterday's notes?"

Something snapped inside you. You always saw this girl either painting her nails or staring out the window during class. And she was asking you for notes? You knew she wouldn't even put them to good use anyway. You whip your head around, glare at her, and shout, in a loud voice, "Why don't you actually pay attention in class and do your own work for once, you spoiled princess?! You're thirteen years old! You have a brain! Why don't you actually use it for once instead of painting your nails or back talking the teachers?!"

"Ugh! Teacher's pet much?!" The girl yelped before crossing her arms. "Hmph! Fine then! I never wanted to copy your notes anyway!" Later, during lunch, you heard her complain about you to her friends. "Ugh! The nerve! I can't believe her!"

"You do need to stop copying notes from people, y'know."

"A pageant girl like me has no need for boring lessons! My life is in the spotlight!"

"Yeah. Minamigawa's pretty stuck up too, always acting like she's all that with all that boring stuff about stars she knows."

"Who cares about space anyway? She needs to grow up."

You wish she could stay in the spotlight forever, and not the good kind. In your mind, she was the one who needed to grow up. But still, their words stabbed you through the heart like an arrow. Nobody in the school had any interest in stars or books. You spent a good few years without any friends.

Sometimes you would catch some teenage girl movies on TV, and the main characters always had friends. Best friends. Best friends forever. BFFs, they were called. You dreamed of the day where you could get a BFF of your own. You had a couple friends, but they weren't devoted enough to be BFFs, and most of them either moved away or went with different crowds later on. That, or they found out about your parents and decided that having two fathers is gross and weird, which made you angrier than anything. For the most part, you were okay with not having friends. But still, it was lonely, and you wished you could have someone you could at least hang out with.

Then came high school, and you met Tasogare Hikage. He was very into basketball, but you and him got along like peanut butter and jelly. He loved your obsession with stars and encouraged it, just like a best friend would. Then you met his sister, Riko. After that, you met her friends Kyoya, Anzu, and Marina. Then you became a magical girl superhero, Cure Starlight. Then you met Starbeam, who was basically a fairy version of yourself. You met Sasami, and finally started an astronomy club. Perhaps God finally decided to be kind to you.

They weren't what you expected, but you finally found your BFFs.


	56. We Will Save Our World!

Chapter 49: We Will Save Our World! Our Lights Will Keep Shining!

Voices. Familiar voices could be heard.

"Riko! Riko! Wake up! Please!"

_Niichan?_

"Hikage! Calm down! She's just unconscious!"

_Mom?_

"Hikage. Don't be so loud. She'll wake up soon. She isn't dead."

_Dad?_

"Neechan...wake up…"

_Rina?_

"But it's been five days already! She could be dead and we don't even know it!"

_Too loud. Keep it down_. The noise level exacerbated the mess of thoughts writhing around in her brain. The darkness was slowly brightening up, turning a slight yellowish green color.

Pretty Cure. Mana-Monster Mana. The Energia being eaten. A white light consuming the dimension. The images that were emblazoned in her mind kept on replaying themselves like a tape recorder. The voices outside didn't help in making them go away.

"Riko! Come on! Answer me! Please! Don't die on me!"

"Ugh…" Riko rolled over in bed as she groaned. Finally, she found the strength to peel her bleary eyes open. The first thing she saw was Hikage, eyes wide with undiluted worry. "Keep it down. You're so loud…" Riko grumbled.

"Riko!"

"Wah?!"

Hikage glomped her so hard she couldn't pull herself out of bed. "Thank God! Thank God you're okay!"

Saki wiped a tear from her face. "Can't...breathe…" Riko croaked.

"Oh! Sorry!" He immediately pulled himself off of her.

This allowed Riko to sit up in bed. She rubbed her black hair with her hand blearily. Her head was throbbing a bit, but other than that, there were no injuries anywhere on her. No scratches, no bruises, nothing. Not only that, she found herself in her room. It certainly smelled like her room, and her stuffed animals, drawings, and everything else was there.

Including Hikage, Arinao, Saki, and Rina. "You're okay!" Rina chirped as she crawled onto Riko's bed and wrapped her arms around her. Riko smiled and rubbed her sister's hair gently.

"What happened to me?" Riko asked.

"Some woman brought you and your friends here. She and Hornbeam healed your injuries," Saki explained, creeping over to hug Riko gently.

The embrace was warm, and Riko's nose caught the scent of fresh cinnamon rolls. It had been a while since she hugged her mother. She always loved being hugged by her parents, and this time was no different. It felt great to feel safe in her mother's arms. She let go of Rina and clutched the back of her mother's shirt, wishing she could stay there forever. She could feel two hands stroking her hair-her mother's and Hikage's. "We're so happy you're safe," Saki muttered.

Riko nodded. "Me too," Then she pulled herself out of Saki's grasp. "Where are the others? What about An-chan, Hotaru-chan, Kyo-chan, or Mari-chan? The fairies? Sorane-chan? Umi-chan? The Queen?"

"They're fine," Arinao told her. "Calm down first, Riko."

"How long was I asleep?" Riko asked.

"Five days," Rina piped in.

Riko did a double take. "Five days?! What?! Seriously?!"

"Uh, yeah! You were out like a light the minute that lady with the unicorn brought you here!" Rina chimed in cheerfully.

"How are you feeling?" Arinao asked.

Riko looked down at her hands. "I...I don't know…"

Arinao put a hand on her shoulder. "It's okay. Don't push yourself."

"Come on, Neechan! Mom made our favorite cinnamon rolls!" Rina chirped.

Riko smiled and followed everyone to the kitchen. She hadn't had her mother's special cinnamon rolls in a while. As soon as she bit into one, she could taste the warmth of her home. But she wished the cream cheese wasn't so sticky. Once she finished, she ate a banana and some vanilla flavored yogurt. "Hey, Neechan! Did you see the unicorns?! The silver haired lady let me touch her unicorn's hair!"

"Mane. Not hair, mane," Hikage corrected. "And they're called alicorns, not unicorns. Unicorns don't have wings."

"But isn't that the same thing?" Rina asked.

Riko chuckled a bit before eating another piece of yogurt. She glanced at the phone on the counter. _'I wonder how everyone is doing? And what happened to Mana?'_ She asked herself. She wished she could see Malgorzata and thank her for saving them. Once she finished her breakfast, Riko stood up. "Mom? Can I use the phone real quick? I wanna call my friends and see how they're doing."

_Ring ring ring ring riiiiiiiing_

"Gee. Speak of the devil," Saki mused.

Riko ran to the phone and answered it. "Hello?"

"_Hey, Riko! Is that you?" _That was Anzu's voice.

"Yeah, it's me An-chan."

"_Thank goodness you're okay! Just so you know, I called everyone else and they're fine too. Anyway, Luminous Pretty Cure meeting at the park at noon! Pronto! Malgorzata wants you to bring your parents along, too,"_ Anzu explained.

Riko stroke the phone gently with her index finger. "How come?"

"_I don't know. She said she has something to tell us."_

"I'll see what I can do, but I'll try and get there. Are the fairies with you?"

"_No. They're on Rozaniela with their parents."_

Riko smiled. _'The family's finally together again. Thank goodness,'_ Riko thought, remembering all the times the fairies worried for their parents' safety and yearned for their presence. She was relieved to find that they were okay, and back with their parents like they had wished for so long. "Okay then. I'll ask my parents if they can take me there. Okay? Bye," With that, Riko hung up the phone. She turned to her parents. "An-chan says she wants us to come to the park at noon. Queen Malgorzata wants to tell us all something, and it sounds important."

"Did she say what it was?" Arinao inquired.

"No."

"Let's go," Saki announced in a low voice. Everyone turned to look at her with wide eyes. "Whatever's going on, the girls are needed."

"Mom! Riko JUST woke back up! You seriously want her to go out there and get herself killed?!" Hikage yelped. Riko covered her ears.

"No, Hikage," Saki clarified. Hikage was stunned to find some tears creeping out from the corners of her eyes. "Let's just at least hear them out. Don't you want to know what's going on, too?"

Hikage pressed his lips together tightly. Truth be told, he wanted to go. He wanted to know what was going on and figure out why Riko of all people had been chosen for this so called mission. After breakfast, the family spent some time together before the proposed meeting time. At eleven thirty, the entire Tasogare household got in the car and drove to the park.

It didn't take long to pick the group out, as nobody else was there. Marina, Anzu, Hotaru, Sorane, Umi, Kyoya, Fukiko, and all of their parents were at the park. Even Sunbeam, her sisters, and her parents were there. Riko was the first to leap out of the car. "Heeeey!" Riko called out, waving her arm around.

"Riko! Be careful!" Hikage yelled, but she paid him no heed.

"Riko-chan!" Umi ran over to Riko and trapped her in a much needed hug. "We were so worried about you! Are you okay? You're not hurt, are you?"

"I was kinda groggy earlier, but I'm better now. You're not hurt, are you?" Riko replied happily as she let go of Umi.

Anzu, Marina, and Kyoya caught up to them. "Lookin' good, Twilight Cat," Anzu joked, gently bumping Riko's arm with her fist.

"Glad to see you made it out in one piece," Marina said.

"I could say the same to you all."

"Actually, we owe all that to Malgorzata. She and Egrantine cast a spell that saved us from getting swallowed up," Kyoya clarified.

"Don't sweat the details! Come on! The Queen wants to speak to us right now!" Sunbeam exclaimed, dragging Riko to the circle. Everyone else followed suit. Soon, everyone sat in front of Malgorzata. The Queen herself had a grim look on her face.

"I'm sure you're wondering why I called you here. I want to discuss certain things with you all," Malgorzata began.

"What happened to Mana-san?" Umi asked. Kayoko turned to look at Umi when she heard that name. Jiroemon did the same.

"She teleported herself to Rozaniela. But we were prepared for her. We managed to subdue her for now. My husband, his friends, and his alicorns, Egrantine included, are holding her captive for now. We want to see if we can get the Energia out of her. So far, I haven't heard anything from Ghislain," Malgorzata explained.

"What happened to Decebal?" Lovebeam asked curiously, scratching what was left of her ear.

"Don't worry. Some of Ghislain's guardsmen managed to subdue him and lock him away," Malgorzata told her. "He is no longer a threat."

"Miss," Sojiro piped in. "Pardon me for interrupting, but...I'm sure a lot of us are wondering the same thing. Why have our children been chosen for this mission? I mean…" Sojiro found himself stammering nervously, but he kept going. "They're only children. They're not mentally prepared for this sort of thing. They should be going to school, playing with their friends, and...having normal lives."

Hatoko stood up angrily. "I agree! Why do they have to do this?! They could die in battle!"

Takashi put his hands on Hatoko's shoulders and sat her down. "Calm down."

Malgorzata pressed her lips together. "You're right. Your children shouldn't have to bear this burden. I don't like it any more than you do. But that was not my decision."

Sorane pulled out her Heart Lighter and showed it to Sojiro and Kyouichi. "She says these are sentient. They picked us, and they only work with people whose hearts they resonate with and have overcome some kind of hardship."

"It's true. Malgorzata said so," Starbeam piped in.

Junnosuke had a lot of trouble comprehending such an alien concept. Sojiro could tell by the way he tilted his head. "How does that even work? Perfume bottles can't decide things for people."

Malgorzata continued, "They were created with our ancestors' omnipotent energy, probably in case of a crisis like this. They only resonate with people who possess kind hearts and a wish to protect what they hold dear. They could pick anyone to be a Pretty Cure. I'm sure it was coincidence that they happened to choose your girls, probably on the fly."

"And you expect them to throw themselves into a bloodbath and get themselves killed?! No way! Not happening!" Hatoko grabbed Marina and held onto her so tight, the curly haired girl had trouble breathing.

"Mom! Get off me!" Marina pushed herself out of Hatoko's grasp, embarrassed by her sudden mother bear personality.

It had been on his mind for a while. He couldn't keep it inside anymore. He held out his hand. "Hold on. What does Katsunuma-san have to do with this whole mess?" Jiroemon finally popped the question.

Malgorzata looked down at her feet. "She...started this whole mess," With that, Malgorzata told them everything, from rescuing Yuusuke from Mana to the current situation. With every word that entered Kayoko's ears, the more her eyes widened, and the more shocked she became. Even Jiroemon was so flabbergasted by Malgorzata's story that he fell to his knees.

"I...I had no idea...this is insane…" Jiroemon brushed his hands through his hair, but it did nothing to ease his tension. Saki kneeled down next to him and stroke his back, hoping to console him somewhat.

"I can't believe she'd kidnap somebody's kid so she could abuse them," Hornbeam piped in, pulling off his top hat. "If anyone laid a hand on my children, I'd make sure that they be punished severely," He held Starbeam close, like a good father would.

Kyoya looked up at his mother, and didn't like what he saw. Kayoko was balling her fists so tight her nails were digging into her palms. She was grinding her teeth, her eyebrows were low, and her face turned red. He wondered if the implications of everything Malgorzata explained to him were dawning on her.

"You...You had Yuusuke all this time?"

Malgorzata said nothing. She simply frowned and stared down at her feet, unable to face the livid mother. Unable to face the truth. All of a sudden, Kayoko sprinted over to the Queen and grabbed a huge chunk of her shirt, lifting her up.

Kyoya let out an audible gasp. "Mom! What are you doing?!"

"Get off her!" Riko wrapped her arms around the woman and tried to pry her off. Anzu, Sorane, Hotaru, Umi, and Jiroemon followed suit. But despite their efforts, Kayoko clutched Malgorzata's garment tightly, staring daggers at the trembling queen.

"Do you have ANY idea how much I've suffered since Yuusuke was kidnapped?!" As soon as Kayoko yelled, Riko covered her ears, and Hikage was quick to escort her away from the scene. "Why didn't you give him back to me?! You sent your troops to save him, right?! Why didn't you give him back to me back then?! You could have saved me and Jiro a lot of agony!"

"Kayoko! Let's be civil here," Jiroemon tried to pry his wife off of the frazzled Queen, but Kayoko swung her free arm at him, making him back away. He had never seen his wife so vicious.

"Answer me, you wretch!"

"Hey! Don't you dare call our Queen a wretch!" Lovebeam hollered. Nobody insulted the Queen. How could Kayoko do such a thing? In a way, she could understand why Kayoko would be so livid. Her first child had been kidnapped and abused, and now her second child was permanently paralyzed-because of said first child, no less. She had every right to be angry. But she didn't have to call Malgorzata names. It wasn't like Malgorzata wanted all this to happen.

"I…" Malgorzata murmured. "We had assumed he was Mana's child. We had no sources confirming that he didn't belong to her. We didn't have the technology to do DNA tests or searches back then," Kyoya could tell her words were true. Malgorzata looked Kayoko straight in the face when she said them, but it didn't making looking at her any less painful. "All we thought about was getting him out of there."

None of what Malgorzata told her calmed her down one bit. Kayoko's already red face contorted with anger. "Didn't you think that he might have been kidnapped?! That he had a REAL family out here that was agonizing for him to come home safe and sound?! You should have tracked us down! You should have looked for us! You could have saved us five whole years of suffering and misery! But nooooo! You had to whisk him away to your alien planet and raise him as your own and give him to some green haired misogynist who used him for his own gain! If you hadn't been so freaking stupid, none of this would have happened!"

"Kayoko! You're not being rational!"

"Shut up, Jiro! She needs to hear this!"

Kyoya backed off. Kayoko never talked to Jiro like that. Not once. Jiro backed off right then and there. His wife just wasn't herself.

"Stop yelling! Both of you!" Arinao tried to break it up, but again, Kayoko swatted her hand at him. He was quick to evade contact.

"You're a stupid Queen, you know that?! You don't even deserve to be a Queen! If you really cared about Yuusuke, you would have tracked us down and gave him back to us, that way he could have had a normal life! You robbed me of a chance to be with my child again after so many years! You should be ashamed of yourself!"

"Don't talk to the Queen like that! She didn't know! She just told you why!" Sunbeam argued.

"That's no excuse for not considering the fact that he had a family out there looking for him!"

"Alright! Break it up, you two! No cat fights!" Marina piped in as she and the others finally managed to pull Kayoko off of the Queen.

Moonbeam flitted up to Malgorzata. "You okay?"

Malgorzata shook her head grimly, the frown frozen on her face.

"I think she gets it, Mom. You didn't have to yell at her like that," Kyoya told her.

Before she could yell any further, Kayoko buried her face into her palms, burst into tears, and fell to her knees. "Why can't you understand...how I felt all those years…? You should have...given him back to me...but you didn't! You didn't, and now the world's going to end because of your stupidity!"

Malgorzata didn't argue, nor did she defend herself. In her heart, she knew Kayoko was right. The woman must have wanted to let those feelings out for years, and now she got to do so. It dawned on the Queen when she performed the DNA test. No, even earlier than that, when Kyoya asked her to do it. How could she not have thought about all of that? The misery she put this woman and her family through...there was no excuse for any of it.

Some tears streamed out of Malgorzata's face, trickling down her cheeks. It was at this point that Kayoko stopped crying. "You're right."

"Eh?" Even Kayoko was surprised to find the Queen silently shedding tears.

"I know. My recklessness caused this entire mess to happen. I should have done something. Tracked you down. None of this would have happened had I done the right thing," The anger that simmered in Kayoko's heart faded away as soon as Malgorzata spoke. "There is no way I can fix what I've done. I can apologize all I want, and it can never change anything or absolve my crime. I deserve no forgiveness. You have every right to hate me, Kayoko-san."

Out of a need to console the Queen, Riko uncovered her ears, ambled to the sad woman, and trapped her in a small hug. She really looked like she needed one. Riko could tell she had been strong for far too long. Even Queens and Kings could be sad, make mistakes, and need hugs, just like regular people. Riko chastised herself for thinking they were perfect Gods who could do anything like the movies on TV showed her.

Crossbeam raised one of her hands. "If it helps you to know, we did ask Zenjin-excuse me, Yuusuke, questions about where he came from and if Mana was his mother or not. He said nothing. He was a difficult child, you see," It broke Crossbeam's heart to see Kayoko so sad. She couldn't blame her. But the only difference was, Crossbeam knew her children were alive, and that thought alone was enough to help her get through the harsh days she spent on Rozaniela. Kayoko didn't have that luxury. For sixteen years. She couldn't imagine living through such pain. "He didn't answer to anyone and was quite a handful, according to Hornbeam. Even if he did know he didn't belong to Mana, he never told us otherwise. We tried."

"He hardly ever responded to me, too," Sunbeam added.

Hotaru clenched her fists and remembered Yuusuke's words. _"They lost me! They let her take me, they did! Why did they let her take me?! They never even came to rescue me! They gave up! They gave up on me! Your mother and father let Mana do everything she did to me!"_

"...He didn't think he had a real family," Hotaru choked out. "He thought you never cared about him and let Mana take him. Kyoya-kun told him none of that was true, and...he almost got through to him…" She wished Decebal hadn't tried to kill them back then, that way they could have taken him to Kayoko and Jiroemon right then and there.

Junnosuke brushed his hand through his scraggly hair. "This is all so out there...aliens, monsters, superheroes, a kidnapping conspiracy...good lord!"

"Now you know how we felt when we first got recruited for this mission," Anzu snarked, hoping to lighten the situation a bit. It didn't work, but she didn't care.

Malgorzata looked at Kayoko. "Would you...like to see him?"

For a moment, Kayoko thought her ears were playing tricks on her. But they were real. She had heard nothing so angelic before. Even Jiroemon couldn't believe it. "We...we can?" Jiro sputtered.

With a sad smile, Malgorzata nodded.

"Where is he?!" Kayoko sprung up from the grass and put both hands firmly on Malgorzata's shoulders. "Where is he?! Take us to him! I want to see my baby!" She wailed.

"My husband took him to our hospital," Malgorzata whispered. "I can take you all there, if you'd like."

Riko let go of Malgorzata and clutched Arinao's hand. "Come on! We wanna show you Rozaniela! It's a beautiful place!"

"It's true! There's big flowers and unicorns and rainbow fish and castles and everything!" Umi added, her sea green eyes twinkling with exuberance.

"No way! Marina's staying here and that's final!"

"Mom! Come on! I'm not a baby!" Marina hissed.

Takashi put a hand on Hatoko's shoulder. "She's right, Hatoko. Let them show us what they're fighting for."

"But you have to admit, she does have a good point," Kyouichi added. "Our children could die. If we lost them…" Kyouichi balled his fists and looked down at the grass. "I don't know what we'd do…"

Hotaru put a hand on Kyouichi's arm. "Kyouichi. The girls and I have managed to get this far on our own. The situation is dire, yes, but if we could survive all of that, then I'm sure...I'm sure we can defeat Mana and get the Energia out of her."

The confidence in her voice was genuine. It had been a while since heard such confidence in her voice, and that was enough to convince him to trust her. Hotaru always made good decisions and had good judgment most of the time. Soon, everyone agreed to go to Rozaniela. Malgorzata performed the spell, and everyone teleported away. Rina was the first to express her excitement at seeing a brand new place.

"Wooooow! Neechan, this place is awesome! Look! Flying unicorns! The sky's all pink and green! Look at those big flowers! Oh! Oh! Rainbow fish!" Riko managed to keep a firm grip on Rina so as to keep her from wandering off.

Even the adults were beside themselves with a combination of surprise and genuine wonder. A place like this existed? And their kids had been here before? What had they been doing all this time? Then again, they already knew, thanks to Malgorzata telling them everything.

"Astounding…" That was all that Junnosuke could choke out.

Saki clasped her hands together and marveled at the beauty of this new world. "My! What a beautiful place!" Saki exclaimed.

Arinao put a hand on her shoulder and smiled. "It sure is."

"This is Rozaniela?" Sojiro asked, clinging to Kyouichi's arm.

"We'll I'll be…" That was all Kyouichi could get out of his mouth.

Hatoko covered her hands with her mouth. "My word…"

"Where is Yuusuke?" Kayoko asked. She was the only adult not in the least bit interested in Rozaniela. Malgorzata nodded and escorted them to her castle.

"I've never been in a real castle before…" Kyouichi said.

"Me either," Junnosuke agreed.

"Pretty cool, huh?" Anzu nudged her father with her elbow, with a devious smile to go with it.

Nessarose happened to appear on the scene with blankets balled into her hands, and gasped upon seeing the Queen. "My Queen! You've returned!"

Malgorzata greeted her kindly with a bow. "Hello, Nessarose. Can I ask where the child is?"

"He's in the infirmary. I'm actually just on my way to take these blankets there," Nessarose told her before escorting them to the infirmary.

Kayoko couldn't believe it. After all these years, she would finally get to see Yuusuke. But something in her heart was gnawing at her, and she couldn't put her finger on it. She silently tried to push it out and focus on what awaited her. Her child was in that infirmary. Her insides were doing backflips. How would he react? How would she react? Would he be happy to meet his mother, or would he be in denial? Considering how damaged he was from the years of abuse he endured, Kayoko assumed a little denial was understandable. But...she was going to see Yuusuke, the child she had lost so long ago. The Gods were smiling down on her at last.

She could feel her hands trembling.

"Here it is," Nessarose opened the door for them. Their nostrils were treated to the bitter smell of medicine as they passed by some people in beds, with bandages on various parts of their bodies.

The kids saw a man in a wheelchair with no legs. A woman on crutches with no legs at all. A man wrapped entirely in bandages like he was a mummy. A woman with a bloody eye patch on her left eye. A little girl with no left arm, crying for her favorite doll. Kyoya had seen people whose limbs had been amputated before, so he had no reason to be afraid. Umi clutched Sorane's sleeve tightly in fear. Riko kept looking forward, staring at Arinao's back. Looking at those people made her want to cry.

"Here he is," Malgorzata pointed to a bed.

Jiroemon and Kayoko had prepared themselves for this moment...but it was so much different than what they had expected.

There he was, lying in a bed, looking half-dead. His crimson hair trailed down to his shoulders, mingling about on the pillow his head laid on. His brown eyes had no light or life to them. He was wearing a knitted purple sweater with the sleeves covering his entire hands, along with a pair of gray sweatpants. He looked ahead, spacing out, not focusing on anything in particular. He looked as though he didn't see nor hear anyone. A child was crying loudly a few beds over, but he acted like he didn't hear a thing. He was no longer the proud, arrogant, vicious, boastful, and bloodthirsty Zenjin who destroyed 80% of Rozaniela and its population.

It hit Kayoko and Jiroemon right then and there: their first child was right in front of them. After sixteen years without him, the Gods had finally gave him back to them. Kayoko's eyes blurred and became warm, drowning in tears. But how he changed! He was no longer the happy, chubby baby that smiled at everyone. He had transformed into this skinny, helpless, lifeless teenager with a permanent frown on his face. The smile he had when he was an infant would never come back. Years of abuse had changed him in ways that were irreversible. But both Kayoko and Jiroemon knew he was their Yuusuke. They just knew with all their hearts that this boy was definitely their Yuusuke. After all these agonizing years, Yuusuke had finally come back.

"Yuusuke…" Kayoko staggered over to the bed, her legs buckling as she got closer to Yuusuke's face. She raised her hand up to caress his cheek. It was freezing, like he had been in a blizzard for a decade. Jiroemon came closer and stroke Yuusuke's crimson hair.

"Yuusuke...it's us. Your mother and father," Jiroemon sputtered. He thought this was a dream. But it wasn't.

Warm tears poured right out of Kayoko's eyes right then and there, streaming down her cheeks like waterfalls. "Yuusuke...mommy's here...mommy and daddy are here...we've missed you so much…" She couldn't keep it in anymore. With a howl, she buried herself into Yuusuke's sweater.

Not even the calm Jiroemon could hold back tears. He buried his face in Yuusuke's hair and wrapped his arm around his wife and first son. He didn't howl like Kayoko did, but everyone could definitely hear the pain in his broken voice. Riko looked away and stared at Hikage. Looking at their reunion was enough to make some tears creep out of her eyes. She didn't want to cry.

Everyone looked away so they could give them some privacy. Kyoya didn't. He watched as Kayoko clutched Yuusuke's hand while crying in his shirt, and Jiroemon stroking his hair and hugging his wife and first child. "Yuu-chan...I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry we couldn't save you! I'm so, so, so, so sorry…" She cried softly, clutching a piece of Yuusuke's sweater. "Please forgive us...Yuusuke…"

Yuusuke said nothing. He didn't even so much as blink his eyes or move. He just lay there, with his parents crying on him. He stared at nothing. He saw nothing. He heard nothing. But...he could feel their warmth. Stroking his hair, touching his face...those warm, loving sensations were real. Was this what it was like to be loved by real, loving parents? All his body had known were slaps, hits, punches, kicks, everything of the sort. But this...this was different. Very different. Normally, he hated being touched, but this was a sensation he couldn't refuse.

Takashi put a hand on Hatoko's shoulder. "Let's give them some privacy," With that, everyone except Kyoya, Malgorzata, and Nessarose left the room.

That was when it happened.

A song came out of Yuusuke's mouth in the form of whistling. The sound was so light and soft that it made Kayoko and Jiroemon stop crying. They looked up, shocked at the sight of Yuusuke whistling. Further more...they knew that song.

"Little Drummer Boy…" Jiroemon said.

Kayoko smiled as more tears dripped off of her chin, melting into Yuusuke's sweater. "My baby...my sweet, sweet baby…" Kayoko hugged Yuusuke tightly. It wasn't too tight, but Kayoko didn't want to let her child go. Not again. She didn't care if he killed an entire planet's population, blew things up, and paralyzed her second child. She was too happy to just be with Yuusuke again.

Nessarose stared at her feet. "The poor boy. They don't know, do they?"

Malgorzata held her hand out. "Don't tell them. They've been through enough agony."

"But...we can't hide the truth from them."

"I know. But not now. They've been hurt enough because of me. They deserve this happiness...just for a little longer," After that, Malgorzata left the room.

"So...what happens now?" Sorane asked.

"Well, my friends are still investigating how to get the Energia out of Katsunuma-san, so for now, we should at least wait," Malgorzata suggested.

"But she's super powerful!" Umi proclaimed. "She could kill you all like she almost killed us!"

Sorane smacked Umi on the back. "Ow!"

"Don't say stuff like that."

"But you know it's true!"

"I understand your concerns. The situation is dire, yes. But I haven't heard anything from my friends, and if there was trouble, they would have contacted me by now. I suggest that for now we rest and wait," Malgorzata told them.

Although the kids and parents were dubious of this idea, she did have a good point. They didn't bother to argue with her, so the kids and fairies decided to take their parents out sight seeing. Kyoya stayed behind to be with his family...the family that had been reunited at last.

* * *

Night fell. Almost everyone was asleep. Some patients had been discharged or picked up by their families. The entire Mitomo family unit slept in the castle infirmary. Kyoya was the first to wake up, seeing the dark walls of the infirmary covered by the blanket of night. He had a red mark on his face from resting his hand on one of the handles of his wheelchair, but he didn't care.

Much to his silent surprise, however, he saw Yuusuke awake as well. But he didn't react like usual. He just laid there, staring at nothing. Kyoya smiled. "Hey. Nii-san? You awake?"

No response.

"You probably can't hear me, but…I don't hate you for what you did to me earlier," Kyoya kept his voice low so he wouldn't wake his parents up. "I mean, it blows and you shouldn't have done that, but...I can deal with it. You could have killed me, y'know?"

Yuusuke turned his head away, as though he didn't want to look at his younger brother. Was it out of remorse, or a way to run from his crime? Kyoya didn't know. He wished he could read his mind. "You could have killed me, but you didn't. You don't...really hate me at all, do you?"

Again, Zenjin said nothing.

Kyoya smiled. "Thanks for not killing me and my friends."

Yuusuke closed his eyes. All he saw was darkness.

* * *

Ghislain and his friends had successfully managed to subdue Mana with the help of the alicorns, and transported her to an underground research facility. Thankfully, it was large enough to take her inside. The problem was, despite their best efforts, they couldn't even so much as go near Mana the entire time.

"How is the subject?" A blonde haired scientist asked.

"Uncooperative as ever. We can't seem to restrain her, and she keeps thrashing and howling," A dark skinned scientist asked.

Mana was trapped in a force field in the middle of a large room. Scientists were surrounding her, and they tried to get past the force field, but if any of them so much as came close, Mana would throw her head against all parts of the wall. She thrashed and flailed so much that she almost never stayed still. They couldn't even administer sedatives, and any kind of magic the alicorns and wizards cast on her did nothing.

"My God! We can't get her to keep still!" A wizard clad in purple robes complained as he shot a ray of light at Mana with his wand. As usual, the spell had no effect.

"I'm surprised the force field hasn't broken yet."

"Don't jinx it! Please!"

"Nothing we do is working," A red haired scientist scratched his head, flummoxed at this situation.

All of a sudden, the force field flashed for a moment. Then it became brighter. "What?!"

"Call security! Call security!"

"It's gonna blow!"

Every scientist and wizard dashed out of the room. The entire force field flashed in a radiant light before an explosion consumed everything. The walls came crashing down or were blown away. The entire room was drowning in smoke. It took about a few minutes for it to clear. But the scientists came back inside and were shocked to find Mana gone!

* * *

The next morning, as everyone awoke, the Queen got a call on her cell phone. "Hello? What?! I see. Alright. I'll send the girls after her. Thank you," The Queen closed her phone.

"What happened?" Lovebeam asked.

"I can tell by your dejected expression that what transpired is very dire, isn't it?" Starbeam asked.

Malgorzata nodded. "Mana-san has escaped."

Sorane squeezed Umi's hand. Hotaru was the one to step forward. "I suppose this will be our final battle, won't it?"

Malgorzata nodded.

"NO!" With a scream, Hatoko threw herself on Marina, trapping her in a tight embrace. "I am NOT sending my baby out there to fight some mutant!"

Marina gave her worried mother a glare. "Got any better ideas?! And get off me!" She managed to pry her hands off of her.

"No! Don't take my baby away! She'll die out there!" Hatoko wailed as she fell to her knees, clutching the bottom of Marina's shirt. "If you die...if you die...I won't be able to go on…"

Riko hugged her mother tightly. "Sorry, Mom."

Some tears trickled out of Saki's eyes as she stroke her daughter's back. "It's alright. It was inevitable. I...I don't want you to go…"

"I know."

"Me either!" Rina wrapped her arms around Riko's waist. "I love you, Riko! Don't die!"

"I love you too."

Soon, Arinao and Hikage joined the hug. "Riko...whatever happens, come back safely. Okay?"

"I'll try."

"Please protect our kids, Queen," Junnosuke escorted Anzu to Malgorzata.

Malgorzata put a hand on his shoulder. "We'll do everything we can, Chino-san."

"Come back safe, okay?" Sojiro said.

"You better not die on us!" Kyouichi added.

Hotaru, Sorane, and Umi nodded.

"Mom! I have to go! It's the only way!"

"I'm not letting you kill yourself out there!"

"Mom! Let go!" Marina finally pushed a red faced Hatoko off of herself.

"We'll stay here and look after everyone," Crossbeam said, holding her four children close, like any mother would.

Junnosuke rubbed the nape of his neck and looked down at his feet. Saki burst into tears and cried into Arinao's chest, with the latter stroking his wife's back gently. Sojiro squeezed Kyouichi's hand like a sad child, shrinking behind him. Hatoko continued to wail loudly. Kyoya rolled over to Hatoko and stroke her back to console her. "We'll be okay here. You guys go out there and save both worlds! We'll be rooting for you!"

Kyoya put his hand out. Riko was the first to put her hand on Kyoya's. "We'll save everyone!"

Umi put her hand down next, then Anzu, Hotaru, Sorane, and Marina.

* * *

Darkness.

It was nothing but an empty void.

Mana floated in the middle of the void aimlessly, staring at nothing in particular. All she could do was gurgle and stare at everything.

Her entire body ached, and jolts of pain surged through every nerve and vein. Yet...everything hurt a lot less than it did before. But it didn't mean she didn't feel any pain.

'_Oh, Chisa...'_ She thought, her mind flitting from one scenario to another, all of them unimaginable. _'How do you expect me to live a day longer without you? That monster...took you away from me...he deserved everything...'_

She saw a blue planet. Something about seeing it made her tick. How dare that planet be so blue, so beautiful, so bountiful and full of happiness. That world and everyone on it rejected her. It took her daughter away.

No longer did she think it was just Yuusuke's fault.

Yuusuke, everyone on that God forsaken planet...they all took Chisa away. God took Chisa away.

She had all the power in the world. Why not get back at God and the world for what they did to Mana?

* * *

Malgorzata sat on a rock in the middle of a desert and prayed. Her eyes opened. "I've found Mana's location. She created her own dimension."

The girls all transformed. "How do we get there?" Cure Skylight asked.

"We know how," Cure Dawn replied, holding her hand out. Malgorzata gestured for everyone to join hands, herself included. They all closed their eyes.

'_Take us to where Mana-san is,'_ They all prayed with all their strength.

A flash. They opened their eyes, and they found themselves in darkness. Cure Starlight was the first to see her. "Over there! I see her!"

Cure Dusk was quick to set her fists on fire. "Let's finish this once and for all!"

"You got that right!" Cure Dawn added.

Mana turned around and growled as she threw herself at the girls. All six of them landed their fists on Mana's sticky face to fend her off. Cure Dawn unleashed her Dawn Sunshine attack on Mana first, with streams of light falling down from oblivion. All of them struck Mana, but none of them left any marks on her. Cure Skylight flitted all around Mana like an annoying fly to make her let her guard down, giving the other girls the perfect opportunity to land some hits on her. Cure Starlight tried stabbing her with her naginata, but it bounced right off, taking her with it. She was quick to regain her composure, though. Cure Dusk unleashed a blazing Flame Fist Fury attack, but it did nothing.

"Emerald Tsunami!" Cure Sealight spun around like a top before raising her hands up, and flinging them down to unleash a torrent of glowing green water. This managed to hit Mana so hard that she wound up losing her balance, once again floating aimlessly. "Now, girls!"

"You got it! Skylight Phoenix!" Cure Skylight encased herself in white light, which turned into the silhouette of a phoenix before charging right at Mana. She hit her so many times Mana didn't have time to react.

Cures Twilight and Dusk flew up and punched Mana square in the abdomen, making her squeal in pain, like a pig being sent to the slaughter. Mana tried to fight back, but Twilight and Dusk managed to hold her off with some quick punches and kicks despite not doing much damage. Twilight didn't like how sticky Mana's...skin and organs felt on her hands and fingers, but this was not the time to be sensitive to sensations right now. The world needed saving. Two worlds needed saving, possibly the universe.

If they couldn't stop Mana and get the Energia out of her, no one could.

They were both worlds' only hope.

'_We will defeat you, Katsunuma-san! We have to, if it's the last thing we do!'_ Cure Twilight thought before shouting, "Twilight Aurora!"

Unfortunately, not even that did much to stop Mana in her rampage. But the commotion did give Sealight a chance to land some kicks on Mana's face. She was about to try punching her, but Mana used her mouth to block Sealight's punch. Her arm was drowning in both saliva and gums. "Ewwwwww!" But oddly enough, she didn't pull her arm out. "Sealight Splash!"

Mana found herself choking on glowing blue and green bubbles, and this allowed Sealight to leap out of the way. Twilight smacked Mana over the head with her tail, and Cure Dawn swung her chain of light around Mana's face and neck to keep her from going any further. This gave Cure Dusk a chance to drive her flaming boot deep into Mana's exposed small intestines.

"That's what you get for abusin' somebody's kid for ten years straight!" Cure Dusk roared before leaping away. "Urrrgh! Why isn't that durn Energia coming out?!"

"Yeah!" Cure Dawn turned to Twilight. "You knocked it right out of Zenjin before, didn't you, Twi?!"

The memory flashed through Cure Twilight's mind vividly. She remembered feeling something hard in Zenjin's stomach, punching him so hard that she rendered him unable to breathe. "But that was only because I was corrupted by my Light Bringer!"

Mana squealed and flailed her body around, almost dragging Dawn along with her. "Aerial Ace!" Skylight was quick to ram herself into Mana multiple times to subdue her. "Now, girls! You know the drill!"

Everyone nodded.

"Pretty Cure Shining Light!"

A white light brightened the void, giving a warmth that was unknown to it previously. It increased in size, engulfing Mana completely. She was helpless as the light consumed her, unable to escape. A young girl's face flashed through her mind.

'_Chisa...'_


	57. The Shining Light of Hope, Cure Light

Episode 50: It's a Miracle! The Shining Light of Hope, Cure Light!

_I grew up in a decent family, a nice house, went to a good school, all that stuff. Everyone said our family was great. But they didn't know them like I did._

A plump young girl of seven years old sat in her room, brushing her doll's curling black hair with a small pink hair brush. The girl herself was wearing a nice pink dress with lace cuffs and a matching lace collar, with pink shoes to go with it. But a frown clung to her face, even as her doll looked her best. Her door was open, so she was able to hear it.

"Do you even care about this family at all?!"

"I work my butt off for you and you don't appreciate one single thing I do!"

"Don't take that attitude with me! All you do is sit in an office while I have to take care of your daughter! I'm sick of being your slave!"

"Hey! I work 12 hours a week every week to pay the bills around here! Can't you at least be grateful?!"

"Why don't you take time off?! You know! So we can actually be a family and spend time together! Don't you care about anything besides work?!"

"I would if you'd stop being an annoying nag! You wonder why I hate coming home!"

Mana closed the door, but she could still hear the yelling. She took her doll, hid in her closet, and cried into her doll's dress. This was a routine she had to endure every week.

_I hardly ever saw my dad, and even when he was here, he and Mother would argue. All the time. But we were well off for a Japanese family. They gave me lots of presents and toys...but never spent any real time with me._

Mana remembered a time when she wanted her mother to come to Parent's Day at school. She wanted to show the kids that her mom was cool, only her mother didn't come. "I don't have time to be lollygagging around a school! Just focus on your studies!" She said. This wasn't the first time Mana was left on her own. When Mana was being picked on for her weight, her mother wouldn't even sit down to comfort her. She was always either in the kitchen washing dishes or cooking, or going around cleaning, preferring to complain about Mana not helping out around the house. At best, her parents mostly just gave her dolls, toys, sewing boxes, and dresses, but never bothered to help her deal with her problems or offer any emotional support for anything.

_It wasn't any better at school either._

Mana always envied the popular kids, the ones who were pretty, had nice bodies, nice accessories, were rich, and participated in lots of school clubs or other extracurricular events. She wanted so badly to have friends. But nothing she did seemed to make anyone want to be her friend. It didn't help that she was shy and could never seem to put two words together, and she was sure that made people think she had some kind of stuttering problem, and who would want to hang out with someone who stuttered? She even went to prom in a beautiful dress her mother bought her for her sixteenth birthday, but not even that attracted anyone's attention. She never even got invited to someone's house to hang out.

It wasn't until years after she graduated high school and worked in a library did she find someone who swept her off her heels. But even that was short and fleeting. After she gave birth to Chisa, she woke up to find her husband giving her a cold, disappointed glare, like he assumed she had committed adultery.

_He wanted a son, not a daughter. He said he had no use for daughters in this kind of society. That was the last I ever saw of him._

_Chisa...was different. She loved me, and I loved her. That made me happier than anything. She was the first person to ever truly love me...to make me feel appreciated, loved, like I was actually worth something._

_All I ever wanted was..._

* * *

Mana's eyes opened. The light from the girls' attack suddenly dissipated. Mana was still her mutated self. Sealight's hands flew to her mouth, and her eyes widened in horror. So did everyone else's. Mana wasn't purified?

"WHAT?! How did she break out of that?!" Cure Dusk yelped, completely flabbergasted.

Malgorzata clutched her naginata tightly. It must be confessed that her hands trembled as she gripped her weapon. "She must have used the Energia to protect herself from the attack!"

Cure Skylight facepalmed. "We knew it wouldn't work and we still did it anyway?! How do we even beat her?!"

Cure Starlight's eyes trembled. Her eyesight was blurring. She balled her fists, grinded her teeth, and looked away, averse to Mana's mutated appearance. "Is this...a hopeless cause?" All the confidence she had mustered over the last few days had been shattered. She convinced herself that they would beat her. Her parents wanted her to come home safely. Everyone's parents and siblings did.

Was Mana...unbeatable?

"No! I'm not giving up! Twilight Serenade!" Cure Twilight was quick to throw a purple ray of light at Mana. As usual, it did absolutely nothing. Didn't even leave so much as a mark.

Cure Dawn reached out to grab Cure Twilight's arm. "Twi. Stop. It's hopeless. We can't defeat her," Twilight's ears twitched. She had never heard Anzu's voice so sad and defeated.

But something was blazing in her heart, and Twilight didn't want it to go out. "We can't give up now! There's gotta be a way to get the Energia out!"

Cure Dusk turned around and buried her face in her hands. "This...is it...for us…"

Both Twilight and Malgorzata gasped and turned around to face Cure Dusk. "What?! Cure Dusk, you can't be serious!" Malgorzata roared. "You can't give up now!"

"It's hopeless!" Cure Dusk whisked back around with tears trickling from her eyes. "We tried everything! We tried our best attack we had and that didn't work! That pretty much proves we can't defeat her!" Cure Dusk swung her fists around to punch something, as though she hated what she was saying right now. "We don't stand a chance against her! Take a hint for once, Riko! Sorry, Queen! We tried! I'm sorry to let you down! But this is where it ends!"

Mana gargled. Twilight was sure she was smiling, as though she was enjoying Dusk's spiel. Dawn, Skylight, Starlight, and Sealight didn't even try to contradict her. Even the Queen herself was at a loss for words. Twilight, however, flew over to Dusk and put both hands on her shoulders, with a firm look on her face. "What's with you?! It isn't like you to give up so easily!"

Sealight recoiled, covering her face with her hands. "Look!"

An ominous black light surrounded Mana, increasing in size with every second. Dusk looked back at Twilight. "You say we can't give up, but what else can we do?! Nothing we did worked!"

Twilight's tail stood up. "We have to think!"

The courage in Twilight's heart blazed further. She couldn't let everyone down. Not her family. Not her friends. Not Kyoya. Not everyone on Rozaniela, especially those who lost their lives. With a piercing roar, a black light consumed everything.

* * *

Malgorzata was the first to wake up to nothing but darkness. But something in her gut told her that this wasn't the alternate dimension that Mana created. It was something different. But what? She saw the other girls floating in different directions. "Where are we?"

"Are we...dead?" Sealight asked, with the tips of her fingers between her teeth, chewing off her nails. She could feel a nail being ripped from a corner of her index finger.

"I don't know. I really hope we're not!" Cure Dusk sputtered tearfully, brushing her hands through her wild hair. "I told you this was hopeless!"

"We can't be dead," Cure Skylight piped in. "I can feel my skin. That's gotta mean something."

Sealight agreed. "Me too."

"But if we're not on Earth, Rozaniela, or Mana's alternate dimension, then where are we?" Starlight asked.

"I don't want to die..." Twilight said to herself. "I don't want to die!" There was so much she wanted to do. Go to high school. Go to college. Make friends. Become a mangaka. Travel the world. See new things. Spend time with her friends forever.

"I think we've been sent to...oblivion..." Malgorzata murmured. To be honest, she didn't know where they were. She felt she needed to give them something, even though she knew it wouldn't be the answer they were looking for. What else could she do?

Malgorzata closed her eyes, waiting for the end. Everything that happened since April flashed through her mind. She was so close to seeing Mana be defeated...but all of her efforts were for nothing.

Was this truly the end for them?

"We're done for, aren't we?" Cure Dawn asked, her brows furrowing. "If we are, then...I want to confess! You guys are one of the best things that ever happened to me!" She cried. "I don't care if we fail! I'm happy I got to be a Pretty Cure! Better yet, I'm happy to have been alive to meet all of you!"

Cure Twilight found herself smiling warmly. "I...I feel the same way. I was always alone before. But then I came to Hikaribashi…" All of the happy memories Riko shared with all of her friends flashed through her mind. "My parents made a good decision. If it hadn't been for all of you, I'd probably be sad and lonely forever."

Cure Starlight could feel tears streaming out from her eyes. She was upside down, so the tears simply floated in the air like small bubbles. "Being a Pretty Cure has taught me so much...you guys blessed me in ways I can't imagine…"

Cure Dusk hid her face in her hands. "You guys...were the first people who treated me like I was my own person."

Sealight floated over to Twilight. "When we're together, we can do anything, can't we?"

"But we couldn't stop Mana-san, could we?" Skylight added.

"No, but…" Cure Twilight closed her eyes. "You all showered me with all your love, and that made me happier than anything. When I was with you...I could be me without shame," Her eyes opened. "Maybe...we've been going about this the wrong way."

"What do you mean?" Cure Skylight asked.

"Please elaborate, Cure Twilight," Malgorzata added.

"All we've done is fight Mana-san. But we were angry with her for what she had done. We saw her memories and why she became the person she is now," Twilight explained. "Maybe...instead of hating her...we should love her. I mean, don't get me wrong, she's done horrible things, I get that, and she needs to be held responsible, but…" Twilight closed her eyes again. "She's lived most of her life lonely and unloved," She clasped her hands together and held them to her chest. "My parents loved me, but I know what it's like to be lonely and sad, to feel like you aren't worth anything."

"We all felt like that at some point, didn't we?" Sealight asked, clutching Skylight's hand. "But we got through it because we had each other."

Cure Dawn found herself smiling. So did Dusk and Starlight. The memories of all the times they've helped each other flashed through their minds. The time Riko saved Marina from Zenjin when she first became Pretty Cure. The time Hotaru first became Cure Starlight and saved Riko and that other girl. The time Anzu stopped a Corrupt Sentinel with just her harmonica right before becoming Cure Dawn. Cure Dusk throwing herself in Zenjin's path before becoming Cure Dusk. Hotaru allowing Sorane and Umi to live with her before they got officially adopted. The time Riko and Moonbeam consoled Lovebeam when she and Sunbeam got into a fight. The time Kyoya and Starbeam helped each other when they were kidnapped by Decebal. The time everyone saved Riko from dying as a Corrupt Sentinel and purified her. Sorane consoling Riko when she had doubts about whether she could truly be a good Pretty Cure and save Hikage. The time when the girls helped Anzu through her ordeal with her mother. The time Cure Dawn saved both Twilight and Sealight from being killed by Decebal. In fact, the citizens of Rozaniela all helped each other after Zenjin decimated their planet.

They all helped each other when they needed each other, because that's what friends do. Friends help friends through the darkest of times, no matter how bleak. "Everyone...thank you for being a part of my life. Even if our lives end here...I'm at least happy I got to know you all…" Twilight mused softly, assuming her time had come.

Everyone nodded in unison, Malgorzata included. "All I wanted to do was help people and make them happy...and that made me happy, seeing all the smiles on their faces…" Malgorzata clutched a chunk of her dress tightly. "That was all I ever wanted."

"We can't die here!" Cure Sealight exclaimed, with a bright smile on her face. "There's still so much we want to do! I wanna own an aquarium when I grow up! I want to be surrounded by fish all the time and take care of them! What do you all want to be when you grow up?"

Cure Twilight was the first to speak. "I...I want to be a mangaka! Or if not that, I wanna be a writer! I want to write stories for everyone and inspire them like they've inspired me! Wonderful stories like Moomins and Hinata Sun Child!"

Cure Dusk swung at the air with her fists. "Hey yeah! I wanna be a rock star! I want to start my own rock band, like Blue Moon!"

Cure Dawn wiped a tear out of her eye. "I want to be an actress on Broadway...and to live a happy, fulfilling life."

Cure Skylight flapped her wings twice. "There's so much about birds I don't know about! Robins, cardinals, blue jays, eagles, hawks, sparrows, heathers, finches...I want to know all about them! I want to fly to the skies like they can!"

Twilight turned to Starlight. "What do you want to do, Star?"

"I…I want…" Starlight's hands were cold and trembling, but she tried to ignore it. "I want to reach for the stars...and solve the mysteries of the universe. I can't believe I ever even thought of giving up on it."

Twilight balled her fists, her green eyes glistening with a new confidence, something she had never had before. "We won't die here. Everyone's counting on us! We have lives to live!"

_CRASH!_

The first thing they saw was Mana. The void had broken, and they were back in Mana's dimension...but with new zeal in their hearts.

The light of hope would never be extinguished. Not if they had anything to say about it!

* * *

What the girls didn't know was that the dimension they were trapped in-Mana's dimension-was being projected all over the world. Over the skies of Japan, America, France, Greece, Italy, Iran, Poland, almost every country on Earth. It was even visible on Rozaniela. How this was possible, nobody knew. But everyone on Earth saw Mana facing off against the girls, and winning.

Kyoya sat in the park, watching the scene with unease. He was surrounded by many people, such as the girls' parents, his classmates, teachers, and other worried citizens, watching in awe of this strange phenomenon being projected in the sky. Fukiko clutched one of his hands for support. "They're gonna win...aren't they?" The frigid wind carried her hair, lifting it up just a little bit, but it did nothing to ameliorate her doubts.

He didn't have an answer for that. He hoped they would. They promised him and everyone else. They couldn't give up. Not now. Now after they had come so far. The world needed them. Both Earth and Rozaniela needed them. They had to win. But what could they do to help them out? They didn't have any superpowers so they couldn't just zip in there and help them out, and it wasn't like giving them words of encouragement would do anything.

Words of encouragement...that was it!

Kyoya let go of Fukiko's hand, cupped his hands over his mouth and screamed, at his highest voice possible. "PRETTY CUUUURE! YOU CAN DO IIIIIIIIT!"

His voice was so loud it made Kayoko recoil. Fukiko had to cover her ears. "Kyoya! What are you-?!"

"Come on, everyone! The girls need us! If we don't give them our support, they're gonna lose!" Kyoya shouted confidently, without any hesitation in his voice.

The parents nodded in agreement. Fukiko smiled and uncovered her ears before waving her arms around, like she wanted someone to notice her. "Come on, Pretty Cure! You can beat that thing!" Fukiko shouted.

Saki raced over to them, yelling skywards. "Go for it, girls! You got this!"

Arinao was quick to join her. So did everyone else. "Don't give up, Pretty Cure!"

"You better beat that thing or I won't forgive you!" Hikage yelled, his hands cupped over the sides of his mouth.

"You're my hero, Oneechaaaaaan!" Rina screamed skyward, with the loudest voice she could muster. She hoped Riko would hear it.

"We believe in you!"

"Don't give uuuuup!"

"You can do it!"

"You're our heroes!"

"Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!"

"We still have a lot to do!"

"You better not die!"

"Come back safely!"

What everyone didn't know was that spheres of white lights appeared from their hearts, gently floating all the way into the dimension. A million other points of light appeared as well, following the others into the dimension. They glistened, even though the sun was blocked by thick clouds.

Even the fairies on Rozaniela cheered the girls on. "Come on, everyone!" Sunbeam demanded, waving her stubby arms back and forth. "Keep cheering for them! Send them all your hope, dreams, and courage!"

"PRETTY CURE! DON'T GIVE UP! WE BELIEVE IN YOOOOUUU!"

Soon, a torrent of glowing spheres stormed out from both Rozaniela and Earth, spiraling into the alternate dimension. "Look, girls!" Sealight shouted, pointing to the wave of light that suddenly devoured them. But the girls weren't afraid. In fact, the tornado of light that swallowed them up felt warm. Comforting, like the embrace of a kind mother's loving arms. The light was so bright that Mana closed her eyes and recoiled, averting her gaze. The warm, radiant light could be seen all over. Suddenly, it morphed into a humanoid shape, but it reached gargantuan size, larger than even Mana in her current state.

Mana opened her eyes. The first thing she saw was a young woman bigger than she, donning a long, flowing white satin dress that trailed far past her feet, with snow white hair that cascaded down to her shoulders. The woman's eyes were a pristine emerald shade, and her smile was warm and bright, like a sunflower. Mana had never seen such beauty. But...she noticed something else.

'_Are you...Chisa…?' _Yes. The woman had the exact same face as Chisa.

The woman shook her head gently. "No. I am the light of hope that shines throughout the universe, Cure Light," She responded, as though she could read Mana's thoughts, which she did. Cure Light clasped her hands together and held them to her chest. "You are suffering because you have let hatred consume you your entire life...and it is what caused this mess."

Mana said nothing. She was too in awe of Cure Light's radiance to care about anything. Cure Light's smile faded. "Why did you do all of this? You didn't have to."

The mutant squeezed her eyes shut and held her head downward, as though she was ashamed.

"What do you want?"

'_All I wanted...was for someone...to love me back. I spent my whole life...loving others...but nobody loved me back...Chisa loved me...when I lost her...my life ended...my love disappeared...'_ Mana found herself trembling in Cure Light's presence.

A single tear trickled out of Cure Light's left eye. "I'm sorry for everything that happened to you. But...did hatred solve anything?" Mana found herself speechless again. "Did it bring Chisa back?"

Mana shook her head. All the times she used people for her own convenience and abused Yuusuke flew through her mind. At that moment, she realized that none of it relieved her suffering. None of it helped her move on. All it did was make others suffer, because she couldn't come to terms with Chisa's death or squelch her own gnawing feelings of guilt.

Cure Light's smile returned. She very slowly kneeled down to Mana's level and extended her hands out to scoop her into her arms. For the first time in a long while, Mana felt warm, comfortable...and loved. The pain seemed to fade away. It was as though she was an infant being embraced by her mother upon entering the world with a hearty welcome. Cure Light lifted Mana to her chest, holding her like she would a normal baby, and held her close. "You have suffered enough, my child. Let go of your hatred. Will you...let me heal your heart?" Her voice was soft, like fur on a newborn kitten. It was the sweetest sound Mana had ever heard.

'_I don't know. My heart is dark. There is no light. No more love,'_ Mana thought. But she had to admit, she hadn't felt so great in all her life. Finally, for the first time in her lonely life-since Chisa died to be exact-someone loved her back, without ulterior motive. She didn't want to get out of Cure Light's warm embrace.

"There is a light in your heart. There is always a light that shines, even in the blackest of darkness. It's time to let go."

Her dulcet voice was so soothing, so gentle and kind. Cure Light stared down at Mana with a warm, understanding gaze, stroking Mana's skin gently. So this was what it was like to feel loved. Mana had long since forgotten that feeling, and she was sure she would never experience it ever again. Now, Mana couldn't be happier.

A white light shone in the sky, and a person with large white wings descended in front of Mana. Cure Light didn't notice. Mana's eyes widened. _'Chisa!'_

'_Mother! Come on! I've been waiting too long for you!'_ Chisa stroke Mana's head and pulled her mother-the real, humanoid Mana-out of the mutated beast. Mana was human again, missing leg included. Mutated Mana's eyes finally closed. The Energia fell out of Mana, falling inside one of Cure Light's large hands. Chisa smiled warmly and carried Mana to a light that was up head.

'_Wow...that light...it's so beautiful...Chisa...I'm so happy...to be with you once more...' _A smile tickled her face. She hadn't smiled so kindly and warmly in such a long time. It felt...wonderful. _'God...I am so...grateful...'_ That was Mana's last thought before she and the angel Chisa disappeared into light. Soon, everything disappeared into the radiant white light, including the dimension.

* * *

Cure Twilight was the first to awake, her ears bombarded by the cacophony of roaring cheers, glorious praise, and joyful shouts. Soon, the rest of the girls awakened to find their friends-both Earthbound and Rozaniela-bound-surrounding them in a large circle, showering them with ovations and applause. It must be confessed that Cure Twilight had to cover her ears. Cure Dawn was quick to give her a hug and stroke her purple hair with a sweet smile and a tear coming out of her eye.

"You did it, girls!"

"You saved our worlds! Thank you!"

"Thank you so much, girls!"

"We love you, Pretty Cure!"

"You're our heroes!"

"Thank goodness you made it out alive!"

"You were totally awesome out there! You were all BOOM and you were like WHAM, POW, SWISH, PHSSHHOOOHH!"

'_We...did it? We...defeated Mana-san…?'_ Cure Twilight thought. Her ears and eyes were burning, and her eyesight blurred. The next thing she knew, her face was drowning in tears. "We did it...we saved both worlds…" Hikage grabbed her and Cure Dawn before both girls burst into tears. Sealight and Skylight embraced each other, fell to their knees, and cried passionately.

"We saved the world, Oneechan! We saved everybody!"

"I know! I know! We didn't die! Thank God!"

"Marina!"

"Mom! Dad!" Marina and Hatoko embraced each other and cried, while Takashi held them close, like the dad Marina had always wanted.

Sojiro hugged Hotaru and brushed her hair. "We're glad you're safe, Hotaru-chan."

"Me too, Dad. Me too," Hotaru sniffed, her tears melting into Sojiro's shirt.

Kyouichi rolled up his sleeves. "Alrighty! When we get back, we're gonna celebrate! Sojiro's gonna make you your favorite dinner! Star shaped noodles, Rotisserie chicken, and mandarin oranges!"

Hotaru held Kyouichi tightly. "I'd like that a lot. I really would."

"Everyone!" Moonbeam, Starbeam, Sunbeam, and Lovebeam all flitted over to the girls and showered them with grateful hugs and kisses. Even Yumiko was barking up a storm, hopping around like she was trying to herd everyone.

Kyoya wheeled over to Riko and tapped her on the back. "Good work, my friend. I'm so blessed to have you for a friend."

"Me too, Kyo-chan. Me too."

Malgorzata watched from afar, holding the Energia in her hands. Tears streamed out from her eyes, but she cried silently, as she was just too overjoyed with the girls saving both worlds. Now Earth and Rozaniela were at peace. But there was one thing to be done.

What was she to do with the jewel in her hands?

There was also another matter that needed to be addressed.


	58. We Are Luminous Pretty Cure!

Episode 51 (Final): The Light Will Shine Forever! Luminous Pretty Cure!

(dream)

_Yuusuke woke up to find himself amidst a twilight sky. It was a swirling mass of soft blues, rosy pinks, mandarin orange, and plum purples, and he could smell the fresh scent of cinnamon rolls kissing his nostrils. But he knew this wasn't real. He was floating in the air, but he didn't have the Energia anymore, so how could this be possible?_

"_Where...am I?" He asked himself in a low whisper._

"_Yuusuke."_

_A soft voice echoed in the air, perking his ears up. He knew that voice anywhere._

"_Yuusuke."_

_An astral projection of Malgorzata flickered in the sky before becoming solid. Normally, Zenjin would glare at Malgorzata with disgust, considering their past together. However, Yuusuke didn't glare. He didn't even look her way. He simply just stared off into the sky. "How did you get in here?"_

_Malgorzata clasped her hands together nervously. "I'm sorry. I used the Energia to project myself into your dreams. I have no intention of staying for long," The Queen looked sheepish. Yuusuke didn't dare look at her. "Since you can't...see, talk, or hear anymore, there's still some answers that I seek."_

_Normally, Zenjin would never even talk to Malgorzata, let alone listen to anything she had to say. But today, he didn't even protest. "Go on."_

"_Can I ask...if we did something wrong?" A misty look appeared in Malgorzata's eyes. Yuusuke could hear the sadness in her voice. He figured that looking at her would make him sad, and he didn't want to be sad. "Do you hate us for what happened? For saving you from Mana-san?"_

_Yuusuke shook his head. "No. You didn't know what Decebal was gonna do," He answered in a soft voice. "I...I don't hate you. I used to, but not anymore. I know the truth now."_

"_Why did you do all of this? You didn't need to be so cruel to Mana-san like that, even if she was cruel to you," Malgorzata told him wistfully._

_Yuusuke pressed his lips together and stared down at his bare feet. "I...I felt I had to. I...I needed closure. She needed to pay for what she did to me all those years...I felt like if I didn't, I'd die."_

_In a way, Malgorzata could understand his plight. She had never been through such suffering herself, but she got the idea. If someone has been wronged, of course that someone would want to get back at them in some way, and more often than not, doing it in rather impulsive and unhealthy ways. "But...that didn't make you happy, did it?"_

_For the first time, Yuusuke could feel a swirl of guilt in his heart. He shook his head. "I thought it would. But it didn't. I wanted to be everything that wasn't who I really was. I wanted to be strong, powerful, merciless, feared," The time he stabbed Kyoya in the back with the scissors ran through his mind again. "I was convinced...nobody truly loved me."_

"_People did love you, Yuusuke. Your real family," Yuusuke could hear the regret in her voice. "I'm only sorry I never gave you back to them sooner. Not knowing where they were was no excuse. I should have...done the right thing, that way none of this would have happened," Malgorzata straightened out some of her hair._

_Yuusuke flashed a small smile. Malgorzata didn't see it. "I know that now," He felt the warmth of Kayoko and Jiroemon's arms and their tears. Sunbeam flashed through his mind._

_The twilight sky was beautiful. "I...don't have much time left, do I?"_

_Malgorzata flinched and looked down when he said that. "It would...seem so. Your body couldn't support such immense energy, and you using your powers so recklessly exacerbated it. Wetzel died the same way, but much later in life."_

"_Wetzel?"_

"_The person who used the Energia before you."_

"_Oh."_

_Malgorzata smiled softly. "Thank you, Yuusuke."_

"_Umm…"_

"_What is it?"_

_Yuusuke floated over to Malgorzata and whispered something in her ear. His breath tickled her ear, but she made an effort to hide it. When he finished, she nodded. "I'll see they get the message."_

"_Umm...to be honest...I kinda wished you were my mother...I was sad when you left me with Decebal."_

_Malgorzata's eyes widened. "I...I never knew this…"_

_Yuusuke smiled. "Thank you...for saving me when you did."_

_After that, Malgorzata's astral projection dissipated. Everything disappeared into a white light._

(end dream)

Yuusuke woke up seeing nothing but darkness. But he was surrounded by Riko, Anzu, Hotaru, Umi, Marina, Sorane, Kyoya, the fairies, Ghislain, and Malgorzata. "Did you get the answers you wanted?" Sorane asked.

"Yes, my dear," Malgorzata took off her headdress. "Sunbeam. Yuusuke wanted me to tell you something."

Sunbeam's ears twitched. "What is it?"

"He says you were the only one who truly loved him on Rozaniela. He wanted to say he was sorry for the way he treated you...before he learned the truth," Malgorzata told her in a soft voice.

Never had Sunbeam heard something so angelic. As soon as the Queen said that, huge drops of tears came right out from her blue eyes, and her face scrunched up so much that she turned red. "Zenjin…" She buried her face in her hands, with Lovebeam gently stroking her back.

"What are you to do with the Energia, Your Highness?" Starbeam asked.

Ghislain held the Energia in both hands, looking down at it with a solemn expression. He knew what he wanted to do. "I think...it is better off gone."

Everyone's eyes widened. "Gone?" Anzu asked.

Marina glared at him. "Seriously?! After all that trouble we went through for it, you just want to destroy it?! That's not fair!" Marina shouted, swiping her hand at him. How could he say something like that? After everything they went through?

"It was the source of all of our troubles. I think it is best if it be erased from existence," Ghislain clarified.

"Wait! Can I borrow it for a moment?" Everyone turned to look at Riko. "I won't use it for anything bad! I just wanna try something!"

"What do you want to try?" Kyoya asked.

"If you wish…" Ghislain handed the Energia to Riko. As soon as she wrapped it in her arms, it almost fell out. It was heavier than three bricks put together.

"Whoa! It's heavy!" Riko exclaimed, mustering enough strength to hold it up. She held it in front of Kyoya and closed her eyes. _'Energia...please heal Kyo-chan's back. Please!'_ She squeezed her eyes shut and prayed as hard as she could.

Nothing happened. No magical light, no sudden healing, nothing. Riko opened her eyes and saw that nothing had happened. "Come on, Energia! Heal his back!"

Once again, the Energia remained silent. "Oh no…" Riko became misty eyed. "Come on! If the Energia can create entire dimensions than it's gotta be able to heal permanent injuries!" She wailed hysterically, almost dropping it. Ghislain managed to take it out of her arms, and her arms dangled to her sides like lumpy pudding.

Malgorzata put a hand on Riko's shoulder, her face a mask of dejection. "I'm sorry, dear. The Energia can only create. It cannot heal injuries. One of the archives detailed what it can and can't do."

"That can't be…" Riko whimpered.

Kyoya smiled and put a hand on Riko's. "Riko. It's okay. I can deal with it. I'm still alive, aren't I?"

Riko smiled and nodded in agreement. Ghislain held the Energia in his hand. He closed his eyes as the Energia floated in his hands, glowing like a prism reflecting the light's colors. "Energia, destroy yourself."

_CRASH!_

The Energia shattered, and its shards disappeared in thin air. A stream of multicolored lights spiraled through the ceiling, ascending into the sky, disappearing into the sunlight. Everyone sans Yuusuke ran outside to watch as all the power in the world spiraled into the sun. But they knew they couldn't stare at the sun for long, as it would leave them blind.

"The power inside deserves to be free...away from evil hands…" Ghislain mused to himself. "Our ancestors should have done this from the start."

Malgorzata smiled and put a hand on her husband's shoulder. "It's all over now, honey."

Umi looked up at Malgorzata with a worried look on her face, as though something was on her mind. "Does this mean we won't be Pretty Cure anymore?"

The Queen shook her head. "No no, dear. Your Heart Lighters are still in tact. You can still use them. But be sure to use them for good," Malgorzata pulled a finger to her own lips. "Can you promise me that?"

"I pinkie promise! Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!" Umi made the hand gestures in front of Malgorzata to swear on it.

"I ought to make a promise, too. Ghislain and I will adopt children legally this time, and seek to reunite others with their real families, so a tragedy like this doesn't happen again," Malgorzata said. To be honest, she felt it came out forced, like she sounded like she wasn't serious about it.

"That sounds like a great idea," Sorane said.

"One more question. Will we not be able to come and visit Rozaniela anymore?" Riko asked, her voice quivering. She really liked Rozaniela, and there was so much she really wanted to see. She couldn't bear the thought of not seeing her fairy friends anymore.

Ghislain smiled. "Of course you can still visit, children."

Anzu cheered and jumped up and down. "Awesome! Yay!" She gave Sunbeam a high five, and the orange fairy happily returned it.

Kyoya turned to Marina. "That's a relief, isn't it?"

"You bet!" Marina fist bumped Kyoya.

After that, Malgorzata carried Yuusuke on her back as she escorted the kids and fairies out of the castle. They teleported back to Earth. Kyoya and Yuusuke returned home. So did the rest of the kids. But Moonbeam and Riko found themselves walking down the street. "It's great that the world has been saved, isn't it?" Moonbeam said, watching a tiny, withered leaf float onto the street.

Some leaves crunched underneath Riko's new sneakers. There was something about the sound of leaves crunching under her feet that was just pleasant to listen to. "Yeah. It is. I'm happy I got to be a superhero. I got to live out one of my biggest dreams and actually do a good job at something."

"You do good at everything you do."

"I guess…" Riko let that sentence drift away as she looked up at the cloudless sky. Had she and her friends not saved the world, they probably wouldn't be any blue sky to look at. "I wish you didn't have to leave. I mean, I know you have school and stuff and your home is there…"

"I know, Ri-chan," Moonbeam said, pulling a leaf out of one of her ears. "But you know I'll be able to come and visit, and you can still come and visit us. Just not as often. Also…thanks for being there for me. For us. I don't think we could have survived without you girls."

"You're welcome," Riko bent down to look at a small purple flower sprouting up from the grass. "Moonbeam?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for being one of my best friends."

"Thanks for being my friend, too."

"We'll always be friends forever...won't we?"

"You know we will. Forever and ever. Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye," Moonbeam made the exact same hand gestures Umi did.

"Promise me you won't forget me."

"I won't, Ri-chan. I'll never forget you. None of us will."

* * *

_**A year later…**_

"Kyo-chan! Are you finished up there yet?" Kayoko yelled, holding a small baby in her arms. The baby was wearing a light pink knitted hat, contentedly wrapped in a butterfly themed flannel blanket.

"I'll be down in a minute!" Kyoya wheeled over to a stair lift at the top of the stairs before pulling himself out of his manual chair. He managed to maneuver himself into the stair lift and pressed some buttons as the stair lift buzzed, pulling him down the stairs. When he got to the bottom of the steps, he pulled himself out and got in his electric wheelchair.

With his backpack on his back, he wheeled past a small butsudan in the living room, with a framed picture of a teenaged Yuusuke sitting in front of a rin gong. Kyoya smiled sadly before wheeling to the butsudan. He took the small stick and tapped the bowl with it. Diiiiiing. He set the stick down and prayed that Yuusuke was doing well in Heaven.

'_Niisan. I'm gonna graduate from middle school today. Next April, my friends and I are gonna go to high school. Isn't that awesome?'_ Kyoya thought before wheeling to the dining room. Jiroemon was holding the baby this time, talking to her in a sickeningly sweet sing-songy voice.

"Is my widdle Eriko hungwy? Is my widdle Eriko hungwy?" Jiroemon sang.

"Jeez, dad. You're embarrassing," Kyoya deadpanned nervously.

Kayoko smiled when she saw Kyoya dressed in a fine black tuxedo, complete with black leather shoes, a white shirt, and a black bow tie. "You look handsome."

"Thanks."

"You have your cap and gown, right?"

Kyoya pulled out his backpack and tapped it twice with his left hand. "Right in here."

"We'd better get going. We don't want to miss the graduation ceremony," Jiroemon said, handing Eriko to Kayoko. "I'll drive."

Kayoko smiled before giving him an affectionate peck on the cheek. "Thank you, dear." A pink lipstick mark stuck to Jiroemon's clean shaven cheek, and his nostrils were intoxicated by her rose perfume.

"Try not to get nervous during your speech, Kyoya," Jiroemon told him reassuringly, like any father would.

Kyoya smirked, like he was planning on pulling a prank on someone. "Oh, I'm not nervous at all."

* * *

Junnosuke could hear thumping sounds coming from the ceiling, as he was in his room putting on his vest. He looked up with a confused expression. _'Is Anzu pretend acting again?'_ Junnosuke thought. Already he could hear Anzu singing some song from whatever musical she was obsessed with. He walked upstairs and found Anzu in her white gown and cap, singing loudly, flailing her arms around, and stomping on the floor. Stamp! Stamp! Stamp!

"_We'll watch the smoke pour out the doors._

_Bring marshmallows,_

_We'll make s'mores!_

_We can smile and cuddle while the fire roars!_

_I was meant to be yours!_

_We were meant to be one!_

_I can't make this alone!_

_Finish what we've begun!_

_I am all that you need!_

_You carved open my heart!_

_Can't just leave me to bleed!"_

Junnosuke found himself dumbfounded. He knew Anzu loved to sing and pretend act, since he knew very well she wanted to be a theater actress. But right before graduation? That was a first. "Anzu?"

"Wah!" Anzu was so surprised by Junnosuke's voice that as soon as she stopped, her graduation cap slid off of her head, falling to the floor. "Hey, Dad."

"It isn't like you to sing before graduation," Junnosuke said, moseying into the room.

Anzu turned red as a tomato as she scrambled to put her graduation cap on. As soon as she slapped it on, it slid off of her head yet again. "Sorry...I'm seriously nervous…"

"Nervous about graduating?" Junnosuke raised an eyebrow. "You weren't nervous about graduating 4th grade."

The nervous girl managed to finally put her graduation cap on, and it didn't slide off this time. "That was different! They didn't make me stand up and give some kind of speech! What if they make me and the girls talk about our battles?"

"I doubt it. Doesn't the class valedictorian give the speech?"

"Yeah, that's true. Kyoya-kun's doing that. But what if the principal makes us Pretty Cure stand up and give a speech? You know I suck at speeches! Remember that one time I-"

Junnosuke put a hand on Anzu's shoulder. "Relax. Breathe. You're going to be fine."

Anzu took in a deep breath before letting it out. "Okay. I'm calm now."

"That's my girl. You about ready?"

Anzu nodded. "Yeah, Dad. I wonder if Kyoya-kun's as nervous as I am."

"Probably."

* * *

"Mom! Stop taking my picture! You're embarrassing me!" Marina held her arms up to protect herself from her mother's camera, which kept flashing a white light at her.

"But, Mari! You look so beautiful in that dress!" Hatoko exclaimed proudly.

Hatoko liked the dress, but Marina didn't. The grumpy orange haired girl was wearing a simple but glossy midnight blue dress with matching dark blue dress shoes with very low heels. Marina begged Hatoko not to make her wear high heels again. The last time Marina was forced to wear high heels, she kept tripping every two steps she took. But the straps on the dress rubbed against Marina's shoulders and seemed to be digging into them. Marina kept pulling at them to reduce the pain, but it didn't work. Marina was never a fan of dresses in general, but she wished Hatoko didn't go crazy over it. On her wrist was a pink and white corsage flower with some green leaves poking out underneath it. Marina was quick to put on her graduation gown and cap.

"Can we go now, Mom? I wanna get this done and over with."

"Come now, Mari! Don't be such a scrooge! Indulge your poor mother, please?" Hatoko crooned in a cutesy voice, which made Marina recoil.

"Hatoko. I think that's enough," Takashi told her.

"Takashi! Marina's going to be in high school after this! We need to cherish the moment!" Hatoko argued, taking more pictures, much to Marina's consternation.

Junnosuke took the camera away from Hatoko without a second thought. "Hey! Takashi!"

"Enough's enough, Hatoko."

"Thank you! Somebody gets it!" Marina groaned.

"But seriously, Mari. You do look beautiful."

Marina turned away and put on her gown. "Thanks. The ceremony starts at two, right? Come on, slowpokes! We oughta get going! If we're late, we're done for!" She dashed out the front door, hoping to avoid more pictures.

Hatoko and Takashi took a while to get to the car. "Mari's come a long way, hasn't she?"

"Yes she has. Now, we can watch her grow together, sweetheart," Takashi kissed Hatoko right on the lips for just a short moment. Marina couldn't help but witness this romantic gesture from the backseat of the car, cackling to herself with a slightly mischievous smile on her face.

The Asagis pulled up to the front of Hikaribashi Middle School, which was abundant with kids, parents, relatives, staff, friends, etc. Marina managed to pick Riko, Anzu, and Kyoya out immediately before darting over to them. "Hey guys!"

"Mari-chan! You made it!" Riko chirped.

"I would have made it earlier but Mom kept taking so many pictures of me."

Kyoya giggled. "I know the feeling."

But Anzu noticed something different...or rather, something wasn't there anymore. "Did you get your scar removed?"

Anzu was right. The scar on Marina's cheek wasn't there anymore. There was some swelling on her cheek, but Marina didn't seem bothered by it. "Yep! I got it removed two weeks ago, just in time for graduation!"

"You look great, Mari-chan," Riko complimented shyly.

Marina let out a sheepish laugh, stroking her orange hair with her hand. "Thanks."

"Aren't you nervous, Kyoya-kun?" Anzu asked. "You're giving the speech, right?"

With a confident smile, Kyoya shook his head. "Nope. I'm not nervous at all."

"There you are!" The kids turned around to find Hotaru, Umi, and Sorane running toward them, wearing casual clothes.

"Hey, girls!" Anzu exclaimed.

Hotaru was beside herself as soon as she saw Marina. "Your scar is gone!"

"I know, right? Everybody's noticing."

"You all look wonderful," Sorane added.

"Hotaru-chan? Don't you graduate, too?" Riko asked.

"My graduation ceremony doesn't start until next week," Hotaru clarified, brushing her braid off of her shoulder.

"I know I graduated last year, but I wanted to come," Umi said, clutching her fish themed purse. "Consider me an alumni!"

"Alumni is only for college people, Umi," Sorane retorted.

"No it isn't! I checked!" Umi argued.

The kids found themselves laughing. Their parents gathered around and watched their kids chat. "It's amazing to see how they've grown," Saki said, clutching Arinao's hand.

"It sure is. They're amazing kids, that's why," Kayoko said. _'Are you watching from heaven, Yuusuke? Your little brother's going to be a high schooler after this,'_ She thought, hoping Yuusuke was in a better place, watching over his little brother.

"You're not gonna believe this, guys! My mom and Takashi-san are gonna get married soon!" Marina announced, her eyes radiant with cheer, her smile so wide it made her face hurt.

"No way! Seriously?!" Sorane shouted.

"Awesome! Congrats, Mari-chan!"

"So he's gonna be your dad now, right? I hope he treats you well," Hotaru added, putting a hand on Marina's shoulder.

"Come on, guys!" Chinami exclaimed, running toward the girls.

Fukiko grabbed Anzu by the hand. "The ceremony's gonna start!"

The ceremony took place in the soccer field across the street. It was perfect, as new spring grass had sprouted, the sun was shining down on the field with all of its golden radiance, and the students all walked through a flower arch before sitting in the middle of the field with almost everyone sitting on the bleachers. Others who couldn't get a seat either sat on the grass, on chairs they brought with them, or stood around. The parents of the Pretty Cure plus Kyoya's managed to all get seats on the bleachers. Many people were recording the ceremony with their video cameras or phones.

The principal was the first to come to the podium and speak. "Welcome to Hikaribashi's 144th Annual Graduation Ceremony! It's a pleasure to have you all here on this joyous day!" He began before going into a long winded speech about moving forward, celebrating the children's achievements, talking about his own experiences as a principal, dreams for the future, all that stuff. It must be confessed that some kids didn't find his speech to be very interesting. Some kids were making faces at each other to pass the time. Others tried to stifle their giggles. Riko occupied herself by thinking about what she accomplished over the past two years. Marina occupied herself by tapping her fingers on her knees like she was playing the drums. Anzu kept kneeling down to adjust her shoes, as they were rubbing against her ankles. Fukiko braided a strand of her hair.

Finally, the principal finished his speech. "Now, ladies and gentleman, one of our students will grace us with a speech he made up himself just for this day. Please allow me to present the 8th grade class valedictorian of 2015," He said in a booming voice, raising his hand toward the student in question. "Mitomo Kyoya-kun!"

Everyone clapped their hands and shouted roars of joy. Riko didn't like clapping, as she didn't like the stinging feeling it gave her hands, so she just smiled and gave Kyoya a thumb's up in silence. Kyoya turned her way and did the same. The principal handed him the microphone. Kyoya remained in place and held the microphone away from his mouth a little bit.

The red haired boy inhaled a short breath before shouting, completely out of nowhere, _**"FUZZY PICKLES!"**_

An awkward silence fell on everyone in the ceremony. Kayoko facepalmed. Riko just covered her ears, giving Kyoya a surprised, wide eyed look of disbelief. _'Kyo-chan?! Did you seriously just do that in front of a bunch of people?!'_ Riko thought. Even the principal was wide-eyed and silent. Riko assumed they were going to laugh at him, or that the principal made a mistake and would ask Kyoya not to do the speech anymore. Riko squeezed her eyes and ears shut, fearing the worst.

One person burst out laughing. Then two. The whole audience burst into laughter, including Kyoya, who, oddly enough, didn't seem bothered by his sudden outburst. As the laughing subsided, Kyoya clutched the microphone. "Sorry about that, guys. I say that so I can break the ice a little and make myself not be nervous," Kyoya explained matter-of-factly.

Jiroemon facepalmed. "Again? I thought he got over that habit!"

Riko opened her eyes and let out a sigh of relief. She looked over and noticed the principal was gesturing for Kyoya to get on with the speech. "Anyway...the legend of Hikaribashi states that when people who were lonely and sad found each other by chance, they wanted to make a place where everyone could live happily so nobody would be lonely or sad. Hikaribashi means _'bridge of light,'_ and I like that, because those people made bridges of light for everyone who wanted someone they could rely on, someone they could call a friend.

"There were times when I thought there was no light at the end of the tunnel, no bridge of light to guide me through dark times. But I wouldn't be the person I am today if it weren't for my amazing parents, Jiroemon and Kayoko, my beloved friends, my helpful teachers, and everyone else who has helped me far more than I could ever have dreamed. Thank you Mom and Dad, for supporting me and encouraging me to keep moving forward. I'm proud to be your son. I want to thank my dearest friends for being there for me and helping me when I needed them. I hope I can be friends with you all forever and ever."

It must be confessed that Riko teared up a little when he said that. She was quick to wipe it away. She was never one to cry at graduation ceremonies, as she always thought they were boring. She couldn't believe Kyoya said that.

"I want to thank my teachers for helping me with my schoolwork or whatever else I needed help with. I want to thank my therapists for helping me get back on my feet, even though...it was in vain. But I'm happy to be alive, to share this moment with my family, friends, and everyone else I love. These past few years have been full of excitement, grief, joy, anger, and a whole bunch of other feelings I can't put into words. All people feel sad sometimes, but it's because we have sadness that we cherish happiness. It's because our lives are short that we humans strive to keep living and achieve great things. We fight the darkness so we can create a light of hope for everyone, to tell them that things get better and that it's not the end of the world.

"Thus, a new school year signals a new beginning. We're all shining like stars in the night sky, making someone out there smile, even if it's just for a brief moment. We're going towards the light right now because we fought the darkness together, and it's because of you all that made these past few years so unforgettable! Each and everyone of you, living or dead, thank you for helping us see another day. Thank you for being shining lights in our lives and mine. We can only hope tomorrow will be even more radiant than today, and that the future is so bright we need sunglasses to see it. No matter how dark things get, even the smallest light can illuminate the darkness, and that light will never be extinguished. Thank you!"

For the very first time in her life, Riko found herself clapping. In fact, she clapped first, and the entire auditorium was consumed by the cacophony of clapping. Kyoya bowed before wheeling back to his place. The principal couldn't help but wipe a tear out of his eye. "What a moving speech."

Next came diplomas. The principal called people out by their last names alphabetically before the kids in question came to the podium, shook the principal's hand, and taking the diplomas before returning to their seats. Since Riko's last name started with T, she was one of the last people to get hers. She reluctantly shook the principal's hand before taking the diploma quickly. She didn't like how hard and cracked his hands felt on her skin.

Thankfully, the last parts of graduation came a lot quicker. The principal made some closing statements before gesturing the kids to throw their caps into the sky. Pandemonium broke out as kids chucked their graduation caps into the sky. Riko didn't throw hers too high, as she didn't want to lose it. Marina didn't hold back, and Anzu's cap almost hit someone had that kid not managed to evade it.

The Pretty Cure kids decided to meet up in an uninhabited corner of the field to have some privacy. Oddly enough, Hikage decided to join them. He had some news to tell the kids anyway. "WHAT?! You and Hotaru are dating?!" Sorane yelped.

Hikage wrapped his arm around Hotaru. "Eeyup! I asked her out and she said yes!"

"I just couldn't refuse such a gentleman," Hotaru giggled.

"Awww!" Umi's eyes twinkled with delight. "That's sooo romantic!"

"I hope you two are happy together," Sorane said.

"I'm sure we will. A lot's happened over these past few years," Hotaru added.

Marina stretched her arms out. "I am SO signing up for those music classes at the high school!"

"I'm gonna join the drama club," Anzu added.

"Hey, Riko-chan!" Umi nudged Riko on the shoulder. "There's an anime and manga club at the high school!"

"No way! Really?!"

"Yep! They're very nice and sweet! I think you'll like it! I'm already a member!"

"Awesome! Do you know how I can apply?"

"You don't have to! You can just show up!"

Riko couldn't resist letting out a girlish squeal, jumping up and down, and flapping her hands. "Yeeeek! I can't waaaaait!"

"Count me in, too!" Kyoya added.

"Hey guuuuuys!"

Everyone looked up to find the fairies, accompanied by their parents, descending toward them, all smiles. "Sunbeam!" Anzu scooped Sunbeam into her arms and gave her a big hug.

"Congrats on graduating!" Lovebeam exclaimed.

"It was a most joyous ceremony," Starbeam said.

"You watched us?" Kyoya asked.

Hornbeam nodded. "We watched you from above so we wouldn't attract unwanted attention. You were all very wonderful back there."

"We hope you'll all stay friends forever," Crossbeam added.

Marina balled her fist. "You know we will!"

"I burst out laughing when you screamed fuzzy pickles, Kyo-chan!" Sunbeam laughed.

"I know, right?" Moonbeam agreed.

Riko looked up at Sorane. "You're going back to school again, right?"

"I'll have to repeat my senior year, but it's okay. I'm happy I get to go back to school again. I got to talk to some of my friends for the first time in a while. Next week we're going to Karaoke Heaven to catch up on old times," Sorane told her with a soft smile.

"I didn't know you were into karaoke," Anzu added.

"I'm...actually a big karaoke geek," Sorane mused sheepishly, stroking one of her large pigtails with her index finger.

"Come on! There's cake over there!" Kyoya exclaimed, pointing to some tables decorated with an assortment of food and other dishes.

"I could go for some cake! Wheeee!" Umi spread her arms out and ran toward the tables like a bird.

Sorane gave chase. "Umi! You better save some for me!"

Marina pushed up a sleeve. "I'm gonna get there first!"

"Oh no you don't!" Anzu followed Marina. All the fairies gave chase sans Moonbeam, who stayed with Riko and Kyoya.

"Want to eat some cake?" Riko asked kindly, holding her hand out to Kyoya, who took it without question.

The sky was already turning a beautiful mixture of blue and pink, and already they could see the first night star shining away, promising a future full of light.

"I am the light that will brighten up your world, Cure Twilight!"

"I am the lights that illuminate the darkness, Cure Starlight!"

"I am the light that will bring in the new day, Cure Dawn!"

"I am the light that will warm your heart, Cure Dusk!"

"I am the light that sparkles on the ocean waves, Cure Sealight!"

"I am the light whose wings radiate the sky, Cure Skylight!"

"I am the light that pierces the night, Cure Daylight!"

"I am the light whose golden effulgence radiates the Earth, Cure Sunlight!"

"Me, Kyoya, the shining light of friendship!...okay that sounded really corny."

"Everyone...thank you very much!"

* * *

**A/N: Finally, this stinkin' story is finished! It was a tough ride, but I made it to the end! A HUUUUUGE thank you to everyone who loves and supported this story! It's because of you I managed to finish it! Thanks MonoTheMonochrome, SugaryDiamond, CureNeptunia, Rainbow169, Heavy Lok, GeckoGecko559, KajiMotomiya, Royal Lovely Pink Rose, MagnificentSoul, and many others! Thank you all so much! I'm all teary eyed! ;_;**

**Also, I'm sorry to all who I offended and triggered. For being a jerk. For not realizing that some elements aren't allowed in the Precure fandom. Let's just move on from this. Please.**


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